The Pelican Brief by John Grisham

Two Supreme Court Justices murdered in one night! But why? Darby Shaw, a law student at Tulane University may know. But there is only one person she can trust: newspaper reporter Gray Grantham. If you love suspense, jump right into The Pelican Brief, John Grisham's bestseller. You won't be able to turn the pages fast enough!

This book is 436-pages of quick reading, murder, humor, and suspense. Grisham builds suspense effectively by using quick action and alternating it with slow, drawn-out scenes. The storyline begins to accelerate with a literal bang. Because of a reaction to her brief, a bomb is placed for Shaw which instead kills Thomas Callahan, her teacher as well as her lover. From this point on, Grisham builds suspense as well as he did in The Firm, alternating artistically mystery with action.

While Darby is running for her life, Gray Grantham works on a story about the murder of two judges. A mysterious informant calling himself Garcia and a tip from Darby Shaw, calling herself Pelican, give him his first insight into the Pelican Brief. Eventually, Grantham and Shaw begin to work together to find the killers. Unable to trust anyone but each other, they have to discover who the mysterious Garcia is and determine who is reponsbile for the assasinations.

Although this book had two or three separate storylines throughout the first half, it was extremely engrossing, and I read it in no time at all. In fact, I was quite sorry when it ended, even though Grisham somehow managed to draw everything to a conclusion in a way only possible in good fiction. The Pelican Brief certainly is good fiction of the type only a select few are capable of writing. n



Review by M. H., New City, NY