The Firm

Product Description

At the top of his class at Harvard Law, he had  his choice of the best in America. He made a deadly  mistake. When Mitch McDeere signed on with  Bendini, Lambert & Locke of Memphis, he thought he  and his beautiful wife, Abby, were on their way.  The firm leased him a BMW, paid off his school  loans, arranged a mortgage and hired him a  decorator. Mitch McDeere should have remembered what his  brother Ray — doing fifteen years in a Tennessee  jail — already knew. You never get nothing for  nothing. Now the FBI has the lowdown on Mitch’s  firm and needs his help. Mitch is caught between a  rock and a hard place, with no choice — if he  wants to live.

From Publishers Weekly

Grisham’s gripping fiction debut describes the inner workings of a law firm set up by the Mafia to launder money and concoct tax evasions. Mitchell McDeere, third in his class at Harvard Law, is wooed relentlessly by the prestigious Memphis tax firm of Bendini, Lambert and Locke. Succumbing to the firm’s high-powered salesmanship, he rejects some of the country’s best-known firms to join the group, where he is awed by the opulent lifestyle pressed upon him. But the company has ruthless, underhanded methods of gathering information (they wire the homes of all associates) and ensuring loyalty (social situations are severely monitored). The firm’s mania for security and secrecy, combined with the fact that the only lawyers who have ever left did so in coffins–five in 15 years–arouse Mitch and wife Abby’s curiosity, and they rapidly find themselves in a labyrinth of intrigue and danger. Grisham, a criminal defense attorney, lucidly describes law office procedures at the highest levels, smoothly meshing them with the criminal events of the narrative. Mitch and Abby are appealing characters, though a suspension of disbelief may be required to accept their super-cool behavior while they are on the run from both the FBI and the Mafia. Nonetheless, readers will be totally hooked by this unusual and absorbing story. 50,000 first printing; Literary Guild main selection; movie rights to Paramount.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

The aphorism “between a rock and a hard place” aptly describes the dilemma of a young attorney pressed by the FBI to reveal crime-related secrets of his firm, while also hounded by his employers to simply take his huge salary and zip his lip. No aphorism, though, can convey the suspense, wit, and polished writing of this laser-sharp candidate for the best recent updating of the David and Goliath story. What’s more, it is all accomplished with just a few whiffs of the heavy duty violence and sex that kick many cops-and-robbers stories along today. Set in Tennessee, the Cayman Islands, and other southerly points, the action moves briskly, relying on character types that are quickly made likable or repulsive. The author, a Mississippi-based criminal defense lawyer, has in this first novel set a daringly high standard, one that his readers will hope he can reach again and again. Literary Guild main selection.

– Barbara Con aty, Library of Congress
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

“Taut, fast and  relentless… A ride worth taking.” —  
San Francisco Chronicle.

“Keeps the reader hooked… From the creepy first  chapters… to the vise-tightening midsection and  on to the take-the money-and-run finale.” —  
The Wall Street Journal.

“Irresistable… seizes the reader on the opening  page and propels him through 400 more.” —  Peter Prescott,
Newsweek.

From the Publisher

At the top of his class at Harvard Law, he had his choice of the best in America. He made a deadly mistake. When Mitch McDeere signed on with Bendini, Lambert & Locke of Memphis, he thought he and his beautiful wife, Abby, were on their way. The firm leased him a BMW, paid off his school loans, arranged a mortgage and hired him a decorator. Mitch McDeere should have remembered what h