The King of Torts

Rating:
Summary: Good Plot, but Disappointing Ending.
Review: I always look forward to a new novel by John Grisham, having read all of his previous published works. Although his last four novels did not exhibit quite the intrigue, character development, and spell-binding plots, typical of his earlier works, they were interesting nevertheless.

For some reason, however, I was expecting more from THE KING OF TORTS, and hoped that it would capture some of the qualities of THE FIRM, THE CLIENT, et al. In keeping with Grisham's trend of declining creativity, though, THE KING OF TORTS was enjoyable, but not outstanding. The ending was particularly disappointing, as Clay's (the main character) avarice had been self-condemned and, as such, should not have cost him EVERYTHING.

Rating:
Summary: No thrills in this legal thriller
Review: I'm a longtime John Grisham fan, but even the greatest writers can strike out. The King of Torts is one of those times. Grisham resorted to "formula" on this one, pouring out a hackneyed plot, with hackneyed characters who have all the dept of mud-puddles.
There is no one to like in this book. The main protagonist Clay Walker goes from being a bored and half-hearted public defender, to a greedy shyster with disturbing speed. There is mild -- and I do mean mild- concern over ethics and his final attempt at redemption -- like the book -- falls short of the mark.

Rating:
Summary: I won't buy Grisham anymore after this one
Review: Can I give this book less than 1 star?

I've been losing faith in John Grisham as an author for awhile, but have continued to buy his books because some of them (Runaway Jury) are great reads. The King of Torts, however, has convinced me not to waste my money anymore. The book has no character development, a plot that is 20 years past its prime, and no conclusion of any interest. The whole time I was reading the book, I kept waiting for something - anything! - of interest to happen. I was sorely disappointed.

Grisham also lets his readers down by failing to do any research into the Washington, D.C. public defenders office (or any other public defenders office). As Grisham admits in his author's note, the "OPD" portrayed in the book is wholly fictionalized because Grisham was too lazy to do any real research or fact checking. If Grisham can't waste his time finding out what a real public defenders office is like, then why should we waste our time on his book?

Rating:
Summary: Fairy Tale Story, Lame Ending
Review: I'm not sure whether to advise John Grisham to take a vacation, or go back to the courtroom. The last few Grisham books have been below his normal standard, and even though I will probably continue to read them, I'll wait for the paperback editions.

We have a struggling lawyer who comes into a fortune when a stranger appears and grants him his dearest wish. Greed takes charge over conscience, and soon he's spending his fortune faster than he can count it. With all his money, he's still not happy, because he can't have the woman he loves.

The book has its interesting bits as you learn what mass tort lawyers are really thinking about when they come to sign you up, but when this goes on and on, it gets boring. It holds your interest only because you're waiting for the inevitable bubble to burst, but when it does, it's a pathetic fade out, wrapped up in a weak chapter.

If you want a fairy tale, read Cinderella instead. This gossamer-thin story has lots of morals, but no substance.

Rating:
Summary: Break and Sue them
Review: All the books I read from John Grisham, The King of Torts might be one of his best books. The King of Torts thrills the reader so much, that you just can't put it aside. The second you start it you will always wonder what will happen next. The King of Torts starts out with a poor Office of the Public Defender (OPC) lawyer, Clay Carter. Clay Carter always had plans of quitting the OPC office, since all the bad cases would land on there shoulders. Then he gets stuck with a strange murder case. This murder case opens the gates of wealth, and hell at the same time. A strange man contacts Clay Carter, promising some clues on the investigation. Max Pace tells him that more than ten of similar murder cases were due to drugs that healed people from addictive drugs. That's where Clay Carter biggest his journey to becoming the King of Torts. The first case was easily settled, and involved a lot of money. Clay Carter receives his share of the wealth, and is kind of clueless of what to do next. Then Max Pace comes again, and tells him of yet another bigger law suit. After his third successful law suit Clay start to wonder where Max Pace gets all these vital clues from, but it's to involve making more money that he doesn't really realize that Max Pace is doing something illegal. Clay keeps on going until the train stops. Will Clay Carter be able to keep going at this rate without really knowing Max Pace? Read the book and find out, it worth every minute.

Rating:
Summary: Current-Events Class, Grisham-Style: But Not Much of A Novel
Review: Grisham is in classic mode here in this pretty-OK book in which a drudged-out, burned-out lawyer is exposed to the glamorous, high-rolling world of class-action lawsuits. The lead character gets kicked upstairs from lowly public defender into mass litigator, a world that is superficially jet-set appealling but ultimately rife with greed and corruption and all but inescapable (sound familiar)?

I'm going to briefly sketch the plot in this paragraph so skip it if you don't want to hear--Clay Carter II of Washington, D.C. meets a mysterious type who gives him the inside dope on how to sue a drug company for surreptitiously testing a new drug inside the USA--completely against FDA rules--and pretty soon he gloms onto the perverse world of mass torts, USA style. The jury system be damned: it all depends on the leverage of data, and who can be blackmailed with it. Almost always neither the drug company wants a jury trial that would expose the corner-cutting and lobbying that puts its "miracle" (and sometimes carcinogenic) new drugs on the market; nor do the litigators who run inflammatory TV spot ads for 1-800 "hotlines" in order to gather lists of those who had been prescribed the drug, so that they can initiate class-action suits of thousands of plaintiffs vs. the drug company. (The lawyers can then take a cut of as much as forty percent of the award, and whether or not the amount of money that trickles down to the actual injured parties is enough doesn't much bother these vultures.)

As for the abuse of the tort system in terms of mass class-action suits, Grisham understands and reports the scenario pretty well. My experience with the overall silliness: because I was overcharged for some generic medications, and because my name was pulled off of some databases somewhere, I received two checks as part of mass settlements; the two together totalling less than two dollars. Pennies don't mean justice to me, but pennies times hundreds of thousands of plaintiffs, over and over, keep "superstud" attorneys in Gulfstreams and private islands and $250,000 Presidential dinners.

Aside from the current-events factor, though, KING OF TORTS has serious structural and generic flaws. Clay Carter II behaves "Just like a man," and I mean that literally: he acts just barely like a man, such a stereotype that after he makes the hop into the hyperspace of nine-figure earnings, despite a leavening of guilt he seems little more than a machine capable of work-drink-eat-drink more-work-drink-find something attractive to go to bed with. Though now a generation older, Grisham owes 32-year-old males more in the way of character development.

Worse yet is the way Grisham has become proficient in editing out Act III and thus eliminating a true climax from KING OF TORTS. The first and latter halves of this book do a great job of setting inexperienced Clay up for a true legal battle in front of a real jury with a REAL antagonist--a non-drug company that made a simple mistake--no politicking or skulduggery involved. That opportunity was denied when the whole Carter law firm was forced to shut down due to lack of werewithal. Imagine how indignant 1930s audiences would have felt if there had been no last reel of "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington": if Congress had adjourned as Jimmy Stewart was running down the hall to give his marathon filibuster AND his seat was eliminated due to redistricting over the summer! That's a lot like what happened here.

I for one do not like it when an author creates a hero and then settles for a "Bermuda Triangle" ending, and that's what we have in this exposition, both ethically and geographically.
.

Rating:
Summary: Appeal Still There but Not as Good as Prior
Review: I do not get as excited about his books as I did years ago. I have noticed the same decline with some of the recent Clancy stuff. So I am not going to buy the new book just out "The Last Juror" which is only available hard cover in my market.

Is it me or is the book? The effort just seems a little weaker than past works? I suspect it is a combination of both. But I have discovered other books such as the Peter Robinson detective books and they seem more interesting - but they are not on the legal system - they are detective stories set in England.

So maybe this book is good for new readers, but for old readers of his stuff - do not not a rush out and buy.

My humble opinion.

Jack in Toronto

Rating:
Summary: What Does A Lawyer Have For Breakfast? Pop Torts!!!
Review: Clay Carter is a young, likeable lawyer working in the Office of the Public Defender (OPD) in Washington DC. He is in his early 30's, hopelessly burned out, snubbed by his girlfriend and her society parents, and basically looking for a miracle to drop from the sky. Lo and behold, it does! Max Pace is an enigmatic sort who promises Clay that the mysterious murder case that has just landed on his desk is no coincedence: if Clay will only take the case, representing the defendants against a greedy and unscrupulous pharmaceutical company, soon similar cases will fall his way and untold riches will be his. Farfetched?? Of Course! Remember, the author is John Grisham, king of the Lawyer's Fantasy stories, who takes the most outlandish cases, makes them just barely plausible, and sends the young, ambitious (male) lawyer on the rollercoaster ride of his life through unspeakable danger to love, wealth, and riches in a getaway fantasy land (usually in the Carribean). Anyway, Clay swallows the bait, makes ungodly amounts of money, shortchanges his clients, and dates an exotic beauty. Yes, but soon, all goes tragically wrong as our lawyer, dubbed the King of Torts by the press, soon becomes the King of Shorts, as his enemies and clients alike seek revenge for his excessive greed. Fortunately, our hero has sown some seeds of goodness as well, and two former colleagues return to his life to offer aid and comfort when he needs it most. A return of his former girlfriend is just as inevitable; however, their reunion is as hard to swallow as their breakup in the first place. (Especially since they tossed each other aside so callously to begin with.) However, no matter. All ends well, and the reader once again finds that John Grisham's world, overly cynical though it may be, is worth exploring, and that the King of Torts is yet another worthwile, entertaining read from an author who has made a career of them.

Rating:
Summary: A Morality Play More Than a Novel
Review: I'm typically a fan of John Grisham. I like his style of writing, and the ease in which I can get through one of his books. While not a fan of all legal fiction, I have really enjoyed his stories of corporate or government corruption in which the small-time lawyer is pitted against the evil corporate giants. Those 'David and Goliath' stories really appeal to me. And that's what this book started out as.

Clay Carter is a public defender in the wrong place at the wrong time. He draws the defense card for an upcoming murder trial. A young boy from Washington's ghettos has killed someone, and it's up to Clay to defend him. Very quickly, he realizes that there's more to this story than there appears. A huge pharmaceutical company has been testing a new medication for drug addiction, and it has the unwelcome side effect of turning some of its users into homicidal killers. Reading this (which comes out almost immediately in the book so I'm not spoiling anything here), I thought I was in for another great book about an ethical lawyer caught up in a sea of corruption, back room deals, and people trying to supress the truth at any cost.

Unfortunately, I was wrong.

Instead of taking this interesting idea and developing another story on par with The Firm, The Pelican Brief, or The Runaway Jury, he uses this storyline to set up a character on the fast track to extreme wealth and ultimately ruin. Clay Carter, through the events of the story, figuratively sells his soul for great wealth and fame. The story focuses on his rise, including a number of high profile class action suits. Throughout the story, the ethics of class action suits are closely scrutinized, showing the pain they can bring to the individual client while bringing extraordinary wealth to the lawyers who don't really know or care about their client.

This book, after the initial plot faded away very early in the book, became a mad race to show how mass tort lawyers earn their wealth, how they spend it frivolously, and how they hurt everyone in their path while doing so. The old saying 'Power Corrupts. Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely' is certainly true of this book.

Don't get me wrong. John Grisham is a talented writer, and this book is an easy read. But it's not a plot-driven book. It's more a long tale of how power and wealth can corrupt a man, and ultimately bring his downfall. As a morality tale, it's a good story. It probably should be required reading for law students, and might also be good for ethics classes to discuss the decisions made by the main character that led to his ruin.

But as a compelling novel in keeping with Grisham's past efforts, this just isn't in that same class.

Rating:
Summary: Really weak.
Review: The subject matter is compelling and interested me, but Mr. Grisham should have limited his scope (and page count) to an Op-Ed piece or a magazine article. There is simply no story here. None. You keep turning the pages waiting for something to happen -- surely this character will have an antagonist of some sort other than (or in addition to) the obvious one, himself. But no.

This "novel" functions as a diatribe against greedy trial lawyers, much of which I agree with, but it's not a story.