7th September 1997

Grisham reaches beyond the law

Grisham’s latest, The Partner (Doubleday), might change her mind. Unlike A Time to Kill and The Rainmaker, this is no courtroom drama. There might be two brief courtroom scenes in all.

And true to the attorney-turned-author’s style, Grisham’s treatment of legal stuff is perfect for the layperson of and anyone else who doesn’t have a clue what a writ is.

The partner is about a guy who was on the run for quite a while, and what happens then he is finally caught. It just so happens that he’s a lawyer, and he’s in trouble for an act that devastated his partners.

The partner is Patrick Lanigan, who appeared to have a wonderful life, family and job. After ripping off his Biloxi, Mississippi firm for a sizeable fortune, he staged his violent death an escaped to a mundane life in a tiny Brazilian town. The book begins four years later with his capture, torture and return to Mississippi.

The unravelling of his crime carries the level of excitement Grisham used to fuel The Firm and The Pelican Brief. He loads The Partner with the breathless anxiety and suspense that hooked his audience in those earlier books - which is good news for those of us who found those qualities miserably lacking in The Client and The Chamber.

While Grisham obviously took pleasure in putting humour into some of his Runaway Jury characters, he has never been accused of creating characters with much depth.

This time, he makes more of an effort, giving palpable emotions to Lanigan and his South American love interest - although in general, Grisham’s female characters remain two-dimensional.

But we’re not talking brain surgery here, so most readers won’t mind too much. What’s important is that Grisham delivers a genuine pageturner, full of friends, foes and geographic detail, as the action darts from the Gulf Coast to Brazil to Europe to Miami and back again.

There’s more of a love story than in his previous books, too, so my sister and some other anti-lawyer types should find new appeal in The Partner. But a word of warning to veteran Grisham readers: This time, things don’t turn out the way you think they will.

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