Literary Glance: The Widow by John Grisham

The Widow isn’t the first book by John Grisham that I’ve stopped reading. Over the last several decades, I’ve stopped reading several of John Grisham’s books. His books aren’t bad. It’s just that after the first few pages I often feel like I’ve already read something similar before.

John Grisham has been writing legal thrillers since the early 1990s (maybe even before that) when he broke out with the bestselling novel The Firm. I was at a bookstore when some random guy told me about The Firm, so I went ahead and tried it (I actually bought it new!). I don’t remember what that guy looked like. It might have been John Grisham himself (it wasn’t).

When the movie The Firm came out a few years later, some critics said the ending of the movie was better than the ending of the book, but I’m not a lawyer, so I don’t know if that’s true. I mean, to me, the movie ending made more sense, but it could have all been fake legal mumbo-jumbo, and I wouldn’t have known.

That’s the thing about about writing about your specialty/professional; you can make up a bunch of stuff and only a few people would know if what you’ve written was accurate. Back in the 1990s and early 2000s when Tom Clancy was writing 1000 page military thrillers, half of the pages in each book seemed like techno gibberish. I half-suspected that he was making up most of the military techno stuff, so I just skimmed those parts. I do the same with legal thrillers.

If I had known that legal thrillers were going to become such a thing, I might have gone to law school back in the 1980s. Instead, I became a teacher. Education ‘thrillers’ don’t exist. I mean, a teacher could try writing a teacher-by-day sleuth-by-night novel, but I’m not going to do it. Everybody has too much experience with schools for readers to be intrigued. Every schmuck in the potential reading audience has had to spend too much time in school as a kid, and most don’t want to read about that crap. Besides, an ‘education thriller’ would probably be sympathetic to the teacher, and right now everybody wants to blame the schools. Even I want to blame the schools, but that’s just because I’m both a parent and a former teacher. I’m torn.

An education ‘thriller’ about a teacher who sucks could be interesting, but that might be used against an author who has vindictive former students. And then the ‘education thriller’ would become a ‘legal thriller’ in the author’s real life. I’ll just stick to reading novels.

Oh yeah! Let’s get back to The Widow.

The first chapter of The Widow seems kind of standard. The lawyer protagonist (I don’t remember his name) meets his client, a widow, who… never mind, you can get a summary anywhere. The protagonist lawyer says “trust me” a lot to the widow and then shows signs of engaging in unethical (maybe illegal) behavior, so the reader suspects he’s the type of lawyer that makes you want to use the internet instead of getting a real lawyer.

EXCERPT

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Occasionally there was a break in the misery when an aging client needed some estate work, like an updated last will and testament.  These were almost always uncomplicated matters that any first-year law student could handle, regardless of how somber Simon tried to make them. For only $250, he could write, or “draft” as he preferred to say, a three-page simple will, print it on heavy gold bond paper, get it notarized by his “staff,” and convey the impression that the client was “executing” something profound.

The truth was half of them didn’t even need a will, regardless of how simple, though no lawyer in the history of American jurisprudence had ever said so to a paying client.  It was also true that the $250 fee was a rip-off because the internet was filled with free simple wills that were just as binding.  It was also true that Mr. Latch would hardly touch the will.  Matilda, his secretary, filled in the blanks and printed the important documents.

*****

Oh yeah!  This excerpt reminded me that I need to take care of a couple simple legal matters.  They’re not necessarily wills, but they’re will-adjacent, and I’m not sure how much of the internet I can trust with stuff like this.  I know that the internet shows you how to do a lot of stuff for yourself, but I also know that the internet doesn’t always tell the truth. 

Sometimes the internet thinks it’s telling the truth but just gets stuff wrong unintentionally.  When it comes to a will or other legal documents, I’m not sure I want to trust the internet.  If the internet gets something wrong, then I can’t blame the internet because I chose to use it rather than a trained professional.  If the trained professional messes it up, the trained professional usually fixes it for free (hopefully the damage isn’t irreparable).  

I’m not sure how much of this semi-legal stuff I’ll do myself.  I might just pay the $250 rip-off fee for peace of mind.  I can get impatient and make tiny (but damaging) mistakes.  Heck, I can make glaring mistakes too.

I probably won’t finish reading The Widow, but it’s not John Grisham’s fault.  I’ve already read plenty of legal thrillers, usually where an innocent person has been accused of murder.  I’m sure The Widow gets more complicated than that.  But sometimes I feel like I’ve read newer books before even though I haven’t read these newer books before.

*****

Still, thank you, John Grisham, for reminding me of some stuff that I need to do! I might even read further just to see if there are any other legal matters that I need to take care of soon.

For more Dysfunctional reviews of John Grisham novels, see…

More Stereotypes in Fiction! A Time for Mercy by John Grisham 

Literary Glance: The Rooster Bar by John Grisham

Literary Glance: Camino Island by John Grisham

A Time To Kill vs. To Kill A Mockingbird     

*****

And here’s my ONE novel!

It’s the oldest story in the world, 1990s style!

Man meets woman; man falls in “luuuvvv” with woman; man gets thwacked upside the head by reality!

The Sunset Rises: A 1990s Romantic Comedy is now available on Amazon and from the trunk of my car!