Grisham Essay -- essays research papers

John Grisham once said of his own writing, â€Å"I write grab readers. This isn’t serious literature.† (John Grisham CLC, 189) Serious literature or not, Grisham has written nine best-selling novels, many of which were also made into very successful movies. Before starting to write professionally, Grisham was a lawyer in Southhaven, Mississippi, which has provided him with plentiful ideas for legal storylines. In many of his novels, Grisham has on ongoing link of novice lawyers who uncover and overcome flaws in the legal system.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Influences during Grisham’s childhood and adult life have helped to shape his writing career. His family moved around a great deal during his childhood. Eventually, they settled in Southaven, Mississippi. (Brandstrom, 2) Grisham was an athlete in high school and decided he was going to play either professional football or baseball. After high school, he went to Northwest Junior College to play baseball. After one year, he transferred to Delta State for more baseball opportunities. While at Delta State, his grades suffered and he decided he wasn’t ment to be a baseball player. In 1975 Grisham transferred again to Mississippi State University as and accounting major. (2) While at MSU, he started writing two books, neither of which was finished. (3) In 1977, Grisham received an undergraduate degree in accounting from MSU. He then went to the University of Mississippi and received his law degree in 1981. Grisham went back to Southaven in 1982 and establi shed his first law firm. One year later, he was elected to the Mississippi House of Representatives.(1) He now had he time to start a new book, which he finished in 1985. He called it Deathknell, but the publisher changed to name to A Time to Kill. The book published a mere five thousand copies during the first print. Grisham immediately went to work on his second book called The Firm. This hugely successful started Grisham on his new profession as an author. He moved to Oxford and has been writing one book per year ever since. Grisham’s courtroom skills never suffered and in 1996 he took time off from writing to return to the place where his career began, the courtroom. This was to fulfill a promise he made to the family of a railroad man killed at work. He prepared the case with the same passion as the characters he writes about and won the biggest verdict of h... ... haunt him. Brock learns that Hardy had been in and out of homeless shelters most of his life, but he had recently begun paying rent in a rundown building; that means he has legal recourse when a big money-making outfit such as Sweeny & Drake boots him with no warning. When Brock realizes that his profession caters to the morally challenged, he sets out on an aimless search through the rougher side of D.C., ending up at the 14th Street Legal Clinic. The clinic's director, a large man named Mordecai Green, woos Brock to the clinic with a $90,000 cut in pay and the chance to redeem his soul. Brock takes it--and some of the story's credibility along with it; it's hard to believe that a Yale graduate who sacrificed everything--including his marriage--to succeed in the legal profession would quickly jump at the opportunity for low-paying, charitable work.(56-90) Brock settles the dispute of the wrongly evicted squatters and thus solves a problem within the legal system. Now, it may se em as though Michael Brock is not a novice lawyer. In reality, he is not novice to law, but he is very much a novice to street law. Although this is a new twist, Grisham’s link continued in this story.