A selection of short stories all based in and around Ford County, Grisham serves up a mixture of rural living with fantastical tales.
As a Grisham fan, I was interested to see how his short stories would develop, and how heavily reliant they would be on legal elements. I was pleased to see that the famous lawyer writer was able to diverge from his usual environments of courtrooms and legal offices, with writing that is still intelligent and hugely entertaining.
I will not tread very far into the plots of the short stories, as this will spoil any readers enjoyment of them. I will say that most of the characters are great to read about, and I did enjoy the way that a few of the stories linked together. It was a shame there was not more of this, I think the book would have been far more effective if there was an overriding element which linked all these stories, rather than just their location in Ford County.
There is a sense with this book that fans of the Grisham back catalogue may be disappointed with the under-developed story lines. His previous works are deep explorations of characters and settings, which seem to highlight drama, social tensions, and legal practices, whilst Ford County seems to offer less.
An entertaining read, but one that fails to live up to the Grisham name.
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