Rating: 
Summary: Very well developed main character.
Review: A lawyer at a prestigious law firm briefly becomes a hostage of a homeless man, and it changes his life as he starts to work with a small firm advocating for the homeless. Well plotted. The lawyer as a character is well developed, and could as easily be a character in a piece of literature as in this amusement. While I would not say the same for most of the other characters, the treatment of the homeless is sympathetic without being sentimental, and the description of the disintegration of the lawyer's marriage is very well done.
Rating: 
Summary: A politcal book but still held my interest
Review: Grisham still tells a good story that keeps you reading even though this is an overtly political book that preaches on behalf of the Homeless and the activists who work on their behalf. I'm not sure it had the intended effect on me. I came away thinking that what the well-intentioned activists are doing is keeping the Homeless locked in their state of dependency as much as all the evil pimps, drug-dealers and bootleggers. The Homeless never have to do anything for themselves. Someone else is always responsible. Surely, there has to be a better way. The "War on Poverty" was lost a long time ago. We need some new generals with new strategies - maybe some Republicans? It's easy not to like workaholic lawyers raking in a million bucks a year running a sweatshop where people work 90 hours a week. It does no harm to remind college students that that's probably the price you pay for "success." But at the same time, I've always been turned off by political activists who want to use the law as club to beat the rest of us into line. All that said, the book is still a very entertaining read until the last few pages when it loses all credibility.
Rating:
Summary: I don't know why..
Review: I don't know why so many people are rating this book so low. I personally loved it and think it deserves MORE then 5 stars.
Rating: 
Summary: Paper Thin
Review: Opening crisis: engaging. Development: zero. Plot: paper thin. Characters: thinner. Premise: more ludicrous than usual -- a greedy big-firm lawyer completely reverses his personality after his involvement in a short hostage crisis. John Grisham's long suit is telling us how morally bankrupt lawyers are, suggesting that he ought to know because he was one and now he's superior to the rest of them. Of course he is: he's quit that degrading trade and turned to selling junk in hardcover. Grisham's method is pure stereotype. He purveys the improbable to the credulous. I wish he could take the energy of the opening scene and make it into a novel with a little depth. Just a little.
Rating: 
Summary: Nope!
Review: Didn't like this one at all. the beginning was interesting but it went downhill repidly after that. WE want the old Grisham!
Rating: 
Summary: Lawyer turned human
Review: Good page turner about an attorney who actually begins to see humanity's needs and acts on them. True Grisham style with few flowery phrases and a lot of quick stepping to keep the reader enthralled. I liked The Firm and Pelican Brief better, but this is a good read. Also recommended: Silent Flight, Devoted Pursuit, a fast-paced story about two sisters searching for an aunt who disappeared into the maze of the homeless.
Rating:
Summary: Fast-paced but runs out of steam!
Review: The book starts GREAT, as our narrator, an up-and-coming attorney in a high-powered DC firm, is taken hostage along with some co-workers, by a homeless man. The scene is tense and grabs your attention right away. After the violent conclusion to his scenario, our hero begins to reasses his priorities, and quickly decides to abandon his firm and begin life as a "street lawyer." This involves filing for divorce, giving up a huge salary, filing suit against his former firm, stealing files, etc. etc. The protagonists life spins quickly out of control, but Grisham doesn't build much tension around these events. Even as we see his life coming apart, Grisham lays right down in front of us the different ways our hero will be able to bounce back again. Grisham mostly uses the book to preach to the reader. No matter how you feel about the issues Grisham espouses, there is no denying that the QUANTITY of preaching slows the progress of the book. Much like THE RUNAWAY JURY, Grisham fails to ever make us believe that our heros might fail in their quest. Grisham is a competent writer, nice and breezy, and when he isn't preaching, his prose zooms along. However, a bit more DRAMA is called for too!
Rating:
Summary: A lawyer with a conscience?
Review: That is exactly what happens in this saga, yet another fantastic deliverance from bestseller John Grisham. This particular young lawyer, our protagonist, works for an extremely prestigious firm, living his life by hours billed, working nights, weekends, clawing desperately for an offer of partner in his firm and struggling mightily up that career ladder. Possessions, he dreams, a Lexus, a million dollar home, it will all make him happy - he is certain of it. But something rather tragic and magical happens one day that turns this money hungrey lawyer into someone who truly learns how to care. This one is yet another of Grisham's page turners. If you have enjoyed his other books, you'll put this one right next to them.
Rating:
Summary: Decent Book - Great Begining
Review: I recommend this book to anyone and everyone who likes a fast pace book. It starts out jumping into the action and detail of the attack form the homeless man. "Umstead took one step into the hallway, grabbed the cart, and was about to pill it back into the conference room when the shot cracked through the air. A lone police sniper was hiding behind a credenza next to Madam Devier's desk, forty feet away, and he got the clear look he needed. When Umstead bent over to grab the cart, Mister's head was exposed for a split second, and the sniper blew it off." Although only the beginning of the book is action packed and exciting like the previous excerpt, there is suspense throughout the chapters to come, and the entire book keeps you guessing.
There is only one flaw in the book. There are 449 total pages, and I think that Grisham could have shortened it a little bit to broaden his audience, and create easier reading for the younger readers. Since the book has such a great number of pages, it is slightly harder to stay interested than a book of smaller volume.
Rating:
Summary: Upbeat and Direct
Review: I liked this Grisham book mostly. The story concerns the epiphany of a high-priced and career driven young DC lawyer at the hands of a humble homeless person. The afternoon when a homeless person called "Mister" holds his law firm hostage, bemoaning the lawyers' exorbitant salaries in the face of utter want and poverty on Washington's streets, our hero hears a chord strike within him, and within a matter of days, he forefeits his home, job, marriage, and lifestyle to become an advocate of the rights of the homeless. I liked this book a good deal because the author uses the first person point of view, which he seldom employs. It lends the story a certain immediacy and poignancy, even though our hero has a ripe sense of the absurd and humor abounds. Our hero is easy to like... sort of the way a puppy is easy to like. How can anyone NOT like someone who gives up a great job and a luxurious lifestyle to fight for society's underdogs? Ideologically, I can't support the morale of the story. While it may be silly to spend seven dollars on a gourmet coffee or to earn a multimillion dollar salary without donating a large and impossible-to-miss chunk to those less fortunate, there is nothing WRONG with those things. Someone who makes millions of dollars a year must work terribly hard for it in almost every case. Grisham's tone says that anyone who earns more than thirty thousand dollars a year should donate the difference to the local soup kitchen or be less than a compassionate human. Also, I have some issues with the hero's marriage, a dead union at the story's outset that leads directly to divorce as he overhauls his lifestyle. What is the point of the marriage? It adds nothing to the overall story and could be essentially the same book without it. However, the story is gripping, and it's interesting in a way books seldom are. It's a book to READ-read, if you know what I mean. I would recommend it to any Grisham fans, or anyone looking to become one... you'll enjoy it.
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