John Grisham is perhaps the reigning master of legal thriller fiction, running faster down the path that Scott Thurow opened than Thurow ever managed and selling books near the Tom Clancy volume level. For awhile it seemed like Grisham got bored, or perhaps just caught in a rut, but trying his hand at other forms seems to have reinvigorated the man.
The Broker, though it will never be confused for high literature, is an amazingly readable, off the track confection. Think of it as a dessert like Death by Chocolate because its so addictive. I bought it in the airport on my way back from Seattle and barely put it down except for sleep until I finished the 420 pages two days later.
Six years ago Joel Backman was the second most powerful man in Washington, the lobbyist uber alles, but when he and his partner, the former Senator from Texas, got too greedy over a prize that dropped into their laps the Senator got dead and Backman was sentenced to spend the next 20 years in solitary confinement in a federal prison. On the evening before the Presidential Inauguration, the outgoing incumbent is deciding on which of the last minute rush of pardon requests to sign when he comes across one for Backman that originates from the legendary Director of Central Intelligence, a man with a Hoover-like history.
Teddy Maynard never believed Backman’s assertions that he’d told all he knew about the stolen prize. Even if that was so, Maynard knew that the mysterious origins of the technology could be revealed by seeing who came after the lobbyist if he was set free, hence the pardon. Backman is released and the terms of his pardon are that he be relocated outside the United States with a new identity, never to return to our shores or contact anyone from his past life. Not if he wants to live.
Sent to Italy, Backman quickly surmises the danger of his situation. How he gets out alive is the treat Grisham delivers. Plus the subplot of our hero adapting to life in a new country, where he only gradually learns the language and the pace of the places, is really well integrated.
definitely recommened
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