23. The Firm

23. The Firm by John Grisham (7/16/2011 - 7/22/2011)

I started this book looking for something fluff-like to read after Interview with the Vampire, and this ultimately was a perfect choice for that purpose.  It's an easy read and super-interesting, especially the ending (which I won't describe because it would give a lot of things away -- let's just say it's very action-packed and high adrenaline).  The plot is simple: a young lawyer named Mitch McDeere takes a job with a small but apparently super rich tax firm in Memphis and his life basically unravels as a direct result of this choice.  It turns out that the firm is really a front for money laundering, among other highly illegal things, and the FBI wants to take it down. Guess who they chose to help them: that's right, Mitch. From that point, the entire book is very on-edge; I've read it before and was still so involved that I didn't notice what was going on around me in the real world -- I kept  wondering if this time, would they get caught stealing documents or meeting with the police or whatever.

It's a well constructed plot that keeps the reader engaged and guessing, and like I said before, it's an easy read. (One thing I will mention is that you do need to keep in mind that it was written in 1991 -- Mitch is bargaining constantly for about 1 million dollars, and that just didn't seem like much to me! But it was obviously a LOT more money twenty years ago.)  I greatly enjoyed it, plus it served its purpose for me, which was to read something that was not dense and would not require a lot of mental effort on my part. Read into that what you will -- it's a good book.