Rating: 
Summary: Great Character Development
Review: This setting wasn't the typical Grisham since the furthest South he made it was Maryland's bay shore. He does include the exotic setting by taking us to the Brazilian wetlands. As usual, Grisham's character development was right on target...he created characters I couldn't stand and others who I would love to spend an afternoon chatting with. There is a little legal maneuvering, mostly contractual and corporate wrangling in nature but not enough to bore people who aren't interested in the legal side of things. The ending was good and left me feeling satisfied. Recommended reading even if you aren't a Grisham fan.
Rating: 
Summary: Good.
Review: It's OK but I would not buy another book by Grisham.
Rating: 
Summary: Great Book !
Review: The Testament was a great book that began with the death of Troy Phelan, one of the richest men in America. He writes a will that gives his daughter in the Amazon 11 Billion dollars before taxes. The great twist in the book is she does not want it. The book tells of the struggle to find her and of the battle to keep the money out of the greedy hands of his other children. The ending of the book will suprise you and makes the 533 pages all worth while. I would recommend this book to anyone who can read at a high school level.
Rating:
Summary: INTERESTING STORY, GOOD IMAGES, WEAK ENDING
Review: In The Testament, Grisham uses his usual style to keep the reader at the edge of his seat until the very ending, when I thought there are somewhat of a letdown. Grisham books are known for the great endings, and this one was surprisingly missing. The testament is a story of a billionaire that dies and his family fights for the inheritance, which he decided to leave to an obscure woman who is doing missionary work with Indians in Brazil. The story is one of character, as we see this missionary resist the inheritance while the family is fighting legal battles in the U.S. to get the money. What I liked the most was the overall scenery of the Brazilian pantanal, a large swampland in midwestern Brazil. The imagery of forest and the adventure aspect of it what new, as I had not seen Grisham engage in adventure type writing (he does it well nonetheless). Overall, I recommend this book, though I would first read The Partner, which I thought was substantially better.
Rating:
Summary: A great book.
Review: John Grisham makes a great description of a family rotten by excess of money. The first character in the book is Troy Phelan, excentric 78 yr old millionaire who committs suicide leaving a handwritten testament in which he leaves noting to his sons, obviously spread amongst different families of his multiple marriages, and spoiled by himself. Despite the eccentricity of the character of Troy Phelan, or the many defects of those who follow the plot as the testament gets to be questioned by his son's to get some part of his fortune, Grisham uses a great description. This creates round characters most readers could identify themselves with in the way they percieve the world. This gets the reader fully entangled in the plot, making it an excellent book.
Rating:
Summary: An easy read.
Review: I give this book 5 stars for a somewhat superficial reason: I found it entertaining. It was my first Grisham novel and a breath of fresh air from some heavier readings I've had. It is a page turner and the book was over before I knew it.
It starts with the mystery surrounding the old man working up his will and it gives you the thirst to find out why his family deserves his malicious intent. From there, the main characters perils in the amazon are abundant, and again, you find yourself frantically flipping pages to see "what happens next".
It fell short for a bit during his encounter with the pastor of the church once back in the states, but it wasn't significant enough to knock a star off the rating.
I appreciate Grisham weaving in the personal battles that Nate deals with in his turbulent life , all the while embarking on his biggest challenge yet, which of course, turns out to be an epiphany.
This book was easy to follow and enjoyable to the very end. And I look forward to my next Grisham book.
Rating:
Summary: Pretty Good!
Review: The testament is a pretty good book. I liked the first part better than the second part of the book. I didn't like it when the story moved to Brazil, but still I think Grisham did put a lot into his research, because it is very well described and he included lots of true details about the natives. The characters are in my opinion, very well developed and easy to follow. The story has enough twists to make it interesting and fun. I recommend the book to Grisham fans because it is very well written and I had a lot of fun reading it. I have many friend who don't read his books because they think it's all about lawyers and things like that. To people like them I say: YOU ARE WRONG! Read one book by John Grisham and you'll be back for more.
Rating:
Summary: Grishman
Review: This is my first John Grisham Novel. It was very complex in plot almost as if i was watching a movie. Grisham has written a great book about a man who overcomes great obstacles, people whos sole motivation is greed and a person who isn't affected by it. This book is super. It keeps you guessing until the very last page.
Rating:
Summary: A Great Book
Review: I read this book to my upper middle school students each year. We do a report over a main character and other activities. I highly recommend this book to anyone. It is a thrilling novel.
Rating:
Summary: Umpleasant lack of precision about Brazil
Review: It happens that I am Brazilian and when I read American novelists and by chance the story has passages held in Brazil or has references to our uses and costumes I always get annoyed. John Grisham is not an exception. His book "The Testament", an adventure which divides its scenario between the courtrooms of Virginia and the Pantanal in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul, in Brazil, gives a completely wrong panorama of Brazil and his people. In some passages Grisham crosses the line of offense. The city of Corumbá, where was taken most of the hints used by Grisham, was not even included between the 200 biggest Brazilian cities. At that time 213 cities had more than 100.000 inhabitants and Corumbá counted around 95.000 in its urban area. The first thing an author has to have in mind before issue a concept about the country and its people is that Brazil is a huge country, more than 8 million squares kilometers wide, where lives more than 170 million inhabitants and where the diversity of culture, costumes, habits and facilities are tremendous.
Anyone that judges the country based on experience in one single location will fall into plain misled. That is what happened with the character Nate O'Riley of "The Testament" which issued his opinions about Brazil by his acquaintances in the small city of Corumbá in the banks of river Paraguai. Starting in page 89 (Island Books - Dell Publishing 2000) Nate ask to his boss "So they have phones in Brazil" In this episode there is a chance, by the comment of his fellow character Josh, that Grisham wants to point out the ignorance of the entire American people about Brazil using the ignorance of his character Nate as sample. The same applies for the estrange thinking of Nate when he boards the plane to Corumbá at page 98. Not considering this idea the thinking is offensive. It is amazing that a writer which also happens to be a law man makes, on page 102, such simplifying explanation about the Brazilian practicing law system. It is not true that courtrooms were not a integral part of practicing law in Brazil. The difference in relation of the American style litigation is that only homicides crimes held a jury. In civil and others types of offenses the courtroom actors are limited to the judge, lawyers, parties and testimonies and no popular jury is involved. So trials are not rare, they just don't apply for crimes others than homicide. Like commons Americans Grisham is only aware of the American style, the rest of the world is simple the rest of the world. Brazilian knows the problems of their public hospitals and are working to improve the system but in inconceivable that the wealthy character Nate have to be conducted (pg.333) to a nasty public hospital in a small town instead of private one just to say a lot of imprecations to be generalize to all hospitals in Brazil forgetting that, besides the problems, Brazil has modern hospital facilities, some even publics, and a advanced research medicine with top awards in genetics, cardiology, plastic surgeon, and AIDS therapy. An American doctor, cogitated, by the author, to be transported from 3.000 miles away would not treat better a patient with Dengue than an experiment Brazilian specialist in tropical diseases. The page 335 statement of "a tide of the finest American-made chemicals" given to Nate is a falsehood. No Brazilian hospitals uses American-made chemicals as a routine. At page 376 we found the worst concept about Brazil made by Mr. Grisham. Is a complete misunderstanding of our culture.
We inherit from our Portuguese's, colonizers, what we call in Portuguese "estamento político." In this context is the bureaucracy which included what is usually known as "despachantes" Since the 70's all the successives governments worked to exclude or at least reduce in our society the bureaucracy monster. The results in those 30 years have been enormous. Today, although reminiscent in interior land and small towns, Brazilians can get important documents trough the Internet automatically. This includes annual IRS declaration since 1996. So, "despachantes" are not anymore a much used figure in big cities except by old class citizens, still aggregated to the past. I don't want to say that the Brazilian bureaucracy is already a wonder but is improving each year.
Besides that, the text of Mr. Grisham is full of mistakes. "Despachantes" were never used for voting. The voting system in Brazil designed and built by Brazilians firms is the most modern in the world where every 100 millions assigned electors in the 2002 election voted in a computerized system trough a electronic ballot and the final results where officially published 24 hours later. Compare this performance with the last American presidential election. Observers all over the world came to the country to study our voting system. Is it believable that a country with such a technology capacity, with a aeronautical industry competing and exporting for many countries which includes United States and Canada could be depicted as a bunch of Indians aside their huts? The affirmative at top of page 377 stating that a American passport was issued for Nate for US$ 2.000 trough the services of a "despachante" is outrageous. First because no American passport can be issued by a Brazilian Government Agency. If some "despachante" was used, was an American "despachante" for the American Consulate services. Second, because a Brazilian passport can be issued without "long lines" for less than US$ 20. Is not forbidden to an author to write the realities about a country but a bestseller author must have compromise with the absolute truth and not create wrong general impressions. Concluding this comment, I still recommend the book as a good novel with a smart plot showing aspect of courtrooms, legal conferences, judges chambers and exotic wild places of Brazil but I do not recommend it for Brazilian readers. Most of them will get annoyed like me with Grisham's misleads
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