Author: John Grisham
Published: October 21, 2025 by Doubleday
Format: Kindle, Hardcover 416 Pages
Genre: Legal Thriller
Source: My thanks to Netgalley and the Publisher for the opportunity to read an advanced copy of this book.
Blurb: Simon Latch is a lawyer in rural Virginia, making just enough to pay his bills while his marriage slowly falls apart. Then into his office walks Eleanor Barnett, an elderly widow in need of a new will. Apparently, her husband left her a small fortune, and no one knows about it.
Once he hooks the richest client of his career, Simon works quietly to keep her wealth under the radar. But soon her story begins to crack. When she is hospitalized after a car accident, Simon realizes that nothing is as it seems, and he finds himself on trial for a crime he swears he didn’t commit: murder.
Simon knows he’s innocent. But he also knows the circumstantial evidence is against him, and he could spend the rest of his life behind bars. To save himself, he must find the real killer.
My Opinion: *I usually find myself swept up in John Grisham’s storytelling, but this novel was a disappointment. The first 40% dragged with repetitive scenes and little momentum, leaving me bored and wondering when the real story would begin. When the plot finally picked up, I held out hope for a twist or spark of originality, but what unfolded was predictable at best.
From the early chapters, the word “grifter” kept surfacing in my mind when it came to Eleanor. Simon, the main character, on the other hand, openly acknowledged his own greed as her lawyer, and with everything spelled out so plainly, there was little suspense left to carry the novel forward. The question became not “what will happen?” but “how long will it take to get there?” Unfortunately, the answer took far too long with little payoff.
The ending sealed the disappointment. It read like an author who had grown tired of his own story, padding pages until he hit the required count. The supposed reveal was so far out of left field that it felt disconnected from the rest of the narrative, leaving no sense of closure. The only faint hope is that Simon might reappear in another Grisham novel, where his arc could finally find resolution.
I watched an interview with Grisham where he seemed almost disengaged from the book, as if he knew it was subpar, yet smug in knowing readers would buy it anyway. That impression was the final nail in my reading experience, making the novel feel more like a contractual obligation than a work he was proud of.
This should have been a DNF for me, but I kept turning pages out of past loyalty and disbelief in that Grisham would let me down this badly.
Once he hooks the richest client of his career, Simon works quietly to keep her wealth under the radar. But soon her story begins to crack. When she is hospitalized after a car accident, Simon realizes that nothing is as it seems, and he finds himself on trial for a crime he swears he didn’t commit: murder.
Simon knows he’s innocent. But he also knows the circumstantial evidence is against him, and he could spend the rest of his life behind bars. To save himself, he must find the real killer.
My Opinion: *I usually find myself swept up in John Grisham’s storytelling, but this novel was a disappointment. The first 40% dragged with repetitive scenes and little momentum, leaving me bored and wondering when the real story would begin. When the plot finally picked up, I held out hope for a twist or spark of originality, but what unfolded was predictable at best.
From the early chapters, the word “grifter” kept surfacing in my mind when it came to Eleanor. Simon, the main character, on the other hand, openly acknowledged his own greed as her lawyer, and with everything spelled out so plainly, there was little suspense left to carry the novel forward. The question became not “what will happen?” but “how long will it take to get there?” Unfortunately, the answer took far too long with little payoff.
The ending sealed the disappointment. It read like an author who had grown tired of his own story, padding pages until he hit the required count. The supposed reveal was so far out of left field that it felt disconnected from the rest of the narrative, leaving no sense of closure. The only faint hope is that Simon might reappear in another Grisham novel, where his arc could finally find resolution.
I watched an interview with Grisham where he seemed almost disengaged from the book, as if he knew it was subpar, yet smug in knowing readers would buy it anyway. That impression was the final nail in my reading experience, making the novel feel more like a contractual obligation than a work he was proud of.
This should have been a DNF for me, but I kept turning pages out of past loyalty and disbelief in that Grisham would let me down this badly.
No comments:
Post a Comment