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John Grisham is a bestselling author known for his legal thrillers, drawing on his experience as a lawyer and politician. His novels have been adapted into successful films, including The Firm and Runaway Jury. Grisham has also written non-legal novels, such as Bleachers and Skipping Christmas. A Painted House is a critically acclaimed novel based on his childhood growing up on a farm in Arkansas.
John Grisham is an author best known for his best-selling legal thrillers like The Firm. He also served in the Mississippi House of Representatives after being elected in 1983. Grisham’s previous work as a lawyer provides the insight that gives his novels rich and intriguing storylines.
John Grisham was born February 8, 1955 in Jonesboro, Arkansas. As a child, he wanted to be a professional baseball player, but he says he didn’t have the talent for it and always reveled in the business world. He moved to Southaven, Mississippi in 1967 and earned a BA in accounting from the University of Mississippi in 1977 before attending the University of Mississippi law school.
He received his law degree and married Renee Jones in 1981. His law firm handled both criminal and civil cases. His first novel, A Time to Kill, had some success, but his second legal thriller, 1991’s The Firm, was a smashing success. Paramount Pictures even bought the film rights to The Firm, for $600.00 United States Dollars (USD). A year before the book was published, he resigned from the Mississippi House of Representatives to live on a Mississippi farm.
The Firm tells the story of a new lawyer who lands a dream job at a luxury law firm only to find his life has turned into a nightmare when murders begin to occur at the law firm. The film version of The Firm stars Tom Cruise, Jeanne Tripplehorn and Gene Hackman. At least ten other John Grisham books have been made into films including The Pelican Brief in 1993 starring Julia Roberts and Denzel Washington and The Client in 1994 starring Susan Sarandon and Tommy Lee Jones.
Runaway Jury, is a 1996 John Grisham novel about jury manipulation. The 2003 film version of Runaway Jury was promoted with the tantalizing tagline: “Evidence is too important for juries to decide.” The stellar cast includes John Cusack, Gene Hackman and Dustin Hoffman.
Some of Grisham’s books aren’t legal thrillers, and they don’t even mention lawyers. Bleachers, released in 2003, is about a group of high school football players who gather for their old coach’s funeral. The story centers on whether the alumni consider their coach good or bad when secrets about him begin to emerge.
The 2001 story, Skipping Christmas, is about parents who consider not celebrating Christmas when they think their daughter won’t be home for the holidays. Instead, they get stuck having to throw a huge Christmas party on very short notice. Skipping Christmas was made into the 2004 family comedy Christmas with the Kranks. The film stars Tim Allen and Jamie Lee Curtis.
A Painted House, published in 2001, is an acclaimed novel by John Grisham about life through the eyes of a poor seven-year-old boy growing up on a farm in Arkansas. When farm workers are hired to help pick his family’s cotton, the boy overhears life-changing secrets. The setting of A Painted House is similar to that of John Grisham’s childhood.
