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The Appeal

Author: John Grisham
Publisher: Century
Category: Book

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Rating: 3.0 out of 5 stars

18 reviews
Sales Rank: 680

Media: Hardcover
Pages: 368
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.4
Dimensions (in): 9.3 x 6.1 x 1.5

ISBN: 1844138232
EAN: 9781844138234
ASIN: 1844138232

Publication Date: January 29, 2008
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
Condition: Brand new book dispatched from UK

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Editorial Reviews:

Amazon.co.uk
John Grisham is now an institution -- a writer whose bestselling status is assured, So assured, in fact, that expectations for each new book are as high as can be imagined. Does The Appeal make the grade? And will it appeal to Grisham admirers -- or disappoint them?

The stakes in the novel's plot are high: corporate crime on the largest scale. The duo of lawyers at the centre of the narrative are Mary and Wes Grace, who succeed in a multimillion dollar case against a chemical company, who have polluted a town with dumped toxic waste. A slew of agonising deaths have followed this, but lawyers for the chemical company appeal, and a variety of legal shenanigans are employed -- and it is certainly not clear which way the scales of justice will be finally balanced.

As ever with Grisham, the mechanics of plotting are key, and the characterisation is functional rather than detailed. But it is (as always) more than capable of keeping the reader totally engaged. Given John Grisham's much-publicised conversion to born-again Christianity, it's intriguing to note here the implicit criticism of the moral majority's religious values, but that is hardly central to the enterprise. What counts is the storytelling, and while the writing is as straightforward and uncomplicated as ever, few readers will put down The Appeal once they have allowed it to exert its grip on upon them. --Barry Forshaw

Customer Reviews: Read 13 more reviews...

3 out of 5 stars

Lost its sparkle along the way April 11, 2008
0 out of 2 found this review helpful

I love Grisham stories but this was dull. I took it on holiday and it remained unread. I picked up a new Author Conrad Jones, Soft Target Novel, couldnt put it down.!!! I like exciting reading but this latest Grisham let me down a little. Still the master though.

4 out of 5 stars

Previous storyline revisited March 31, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful

Grisham revists 'The Rainmaker' and 'The Tort King' in exposing his distaste of US style class actions again.

This trip along familiar paths nicely interweaves an election with most of the accompanying financial shenaginans and under-hand dealing that US elections are (in)famous for. Also, thrown in for good measure, is how corporate bosses manipulate events to further bolster their own nests.

The underlying theme is not necessarily 'good' (the locals) triumphing over 'bad' (business) but revealing that the defendants are rarely the greedy party. It also tries to highlight that high-cost class actions actually work against the claimants in the wider sense.

One of the central characters suffers a freaky about-turn of fate towards the end that causes a massive soul-searching with an unusal twist.

2 out of 5 stars

Much ado about nothing March 23, 2008
1 out of 2 found this review helpful

I've just finished reading more than 250 pages of filler with nothing worth mentioning at the end of it all, except that the ending "majorly" sucked.

Essentially a sordid tale of big business and politics vs. big verdicts and class action lawsuits, it begins nicely, and gathers steam, then proceeds to continue blowing hot air at the reader until the unsatisfactory quickie ending.

While there's some food for thought regarding how the legal, political, religious and business arenas may all be connected, there's more garnish than meat in a story which could have been cut by about 100 pages of the filler, and sweetened with about 50 more pages of conclusion for dessert.

Short Attention Span Summary (SASS)

1. Large company dumps chemicals in rural community
2. Water changes color
3. People get sick
4. Some die
5. Small law firm files lawsuit
6. Large verdict awarded
7. Big business takes over
8. Money talks
9. Once again, Grisham gets tired of his own rambling and wraps up story in indecent haste leaving most of his ends dangling
10. His ends aren't pretty

I'd like to sue for 50% of my money back, plus loss of productive time, legal costs and mental trauma, and also for punitive damages, but I guess I'd lose on appeal.

Rated: 2.5 stars for half of a good book

Amanda Richards

1 out of 5 stars

No Appeal Whatsoever March 21, 2008
2 out of 4 found this review helpful

Each one of John Grisham's legal novels are reading more and more like a movie screenplay every time, and The Appeal continues to do so. Whilst the author's experience of the legal profession shines forth, the characters lack any depth. One of the key characters Carl Trudeau, a chemical company billionaire is just flat and one dimensional, whilst the manipulated Ron Fisk is just too dull to care about. There is also a large chunk early in the book devoted to a party for a work of art. Relevance? the name of the art ends up being the name of Trudeau's yacht at the end of the book! Seriously, do we care or even need to know.
This book also suffers some lazy writing, in one chapter we are given the pecise location of a town, a few miles east of this place, and a few miles north of that. Who cares? this is just a simple case of words filling pages. The story needs much more character development, the reader is left indifferent to even the most hard done by individuals.
Whilst the premise of the story sounds great, it is my recommendation that you leave this particular John Grisham offering to languish.

2 out of 5 stars

Great subject - Slack execution March 17, 2008
0 out of 2 found this review helpful

Buying elections has become a big business. Sometimes it works (Bush)and sometimes it fails miserably (Huffington). I've enjoyed some of Grisham in the past, especially when he moved away from an earlier tendancy to interchangable plots involving bright young rookie idealist lawyer doing battle with The Man.

This time round The Man has a name and has technically already lost against the bright young not so rookie idealist couple. So he appeals and buys a supreme court candidate to bury it when the time comes. So for so readable.

PLOT SPOILER COMING.

The trouble is that there's no payoff in this book. It's not that it doesn't end happily, I've read plenty of books by the likes of Dostoevsky and Euripides that don't have happy endings but the payoff is that the reader might gain some insight into the human psyche or the way the World turns in the process. Grisham however is not a great tragedian. He lays all sorts of traps for the bad guys to fail (the knowing wife, his lawyer's secret memo, the 'bought' judge's family tragedy) and then ignores them all in the last five or six pages to force a clunky ending where the bad guys win everything followed by an even clunkier description of The Man's celebratory party.

Maybe he was getting bored and wanted to stick it to our expectations. Whatever else, it's his book and he can send it anyway he wants but this does not excuse the fact that an entertaining piece of black/white hero/villain polemic ends with readers thinking "Yes? And?" as they become ex-Grisham fans. The result is a book dealing with a rich subject for satire and anger but with absolutely no resonance.

Something tells me the next one will end happily.