Book Review / The Rainmaker by John Grisham

Grisham's sixth spellbinding novel of legal intrigue and corporate greed displays all of the intricate plotting, fast-paced action, humor, and suspense that have made him the most popular author of our time. In his first courtroom thriller since A Time To Kill, John Grisham tells the story of a young man barely out of law school who finds himself taking on one of the most powerful, corrupt, and ruthless companies in America -- and exposing a complex, multibillion-dollar insurance scam. 

In hs final semester of law school Rudy Baylor is required to provide free legal advice to a group of senior citizens, and it is there that he meets his first "clients," Dot and Buddy Black. Their son, Donny Ray, is dying of leukemia, and their insurance company has flatly refused to pay for his medical treatments. While Rudy is at first skeptical, he soon realizes that the Blacks really have been shockingly mistreated by the huge company, and that he just may have stumbled upon one of the largest insurance frauds anyone's ever seen -- and one of the most lucrative and important cases in the history of civil litigation. The problem is, Rudy's flat broke, has no job, hasn't even passed the bar, and is about to go head-to-head with one of the best defense attorneys -- and powerful industries -- in America.

Published:     First Published in 1991
Goodreads :  Click here
Series or Stand-Alone:  Stand-Alone
Source:  Owned

MY REVIEW

Now, this is one John Grisham book that I hadn't read yet so I was very excited to get into this one.  There's something about John Grisham's writing that just sucks me in every time.  This one was no exception.  You have the perfect balance of a young lawyer who finds himself having to take his work life into his own hands, which may lead him down a path that might not be the right one but may be the right one for him.  At the beginning, he lands a couple of clients - one with a Will that needs drafting and a potential inheritance to leave of millions and the other is a couple with a son who is dying but his life could have been saved if the insurance company had paid out for his medical procedures.

Of course, I loved the majority of this book but my favourite plot line had to be the actual trial.  You have Rudy who is pretty much fresh out of law school in his first trial and up against a team of many more senior lawyers and an insurance company that has more than enough money to cover whatever legal expenses they need. 

If I had to be picky, I wasn't too keen on the ending.  Obviously, I won't spoil it for those of you who haven't read it but let's just say you have a lot of built up in plot and characters in this book and the ending just didn't match up with that.  It is more like a swift shift in another direction.

That said, I loved this story and the characters.  It was so easy to get lost in both of those and lose track of time (which I did many times reading this one).