Jake Brigance, the lawyer from A Time to Kill, is back, and this time he’s representing an estate, not a killer. A Mississippi tycoon has committed suicide and left his millions to his African-American housekeeper. A lot of local whites don’t like this. A platoon of top lawyers lines up against Jake to drag the will into probate hell.
This book has little of the twisting, high-octane plotwork that made Grisham’s first eight or nine novels so much fun. It’s more of a straight legal procedural than a thriller, and at times the intrigue feels mechanical, but the legal machinations are fascinating enough to carry you happily through to the end. Reviewed on March 4, 2021