Mr. Grisham,

I hope you are checking reviews on Amazon. After reading The Firm, I wonder how you'd spin the twists and turns if the book was written today.

With GPS, wire tab, internet, Blackberry/iPhone, and so on, Mitch & Abby McDeere may never outrun the mafia and FBI. It'd take more than a lawyer's smarts to outgun modern tracing devices.

As a matter of fact, the whole premise could be very similar to one of Will Smith's films "Enemy of the State", of which a modern version of an old Gene Hackman (who's in the film version of The Firm) film "The Conversation".

It is very interesting how modern techology can render many plausible scenarios in the books obsolete: a cell phone, a data mining service, or a satellite can pinpoint your every move and whereabout.....

A reader

The Firm was published in 1991, and almost overnight John Grisham became a household name and a force to be reckoned with in the realm of fiction.

Mitch McDeere (whom many may still envision as Tom Cruise, since he played in the role in the movie based on this novel) is a highly intelligent yet monetarily challenged law student finishing up his degree with high honors at Harvard. Holding serious offers from prestigious Chicago and Wall Street law firms for his services, he decides to go ahead and hear the pitch from a smaller law firm in Memphis.

What he hears is an offer he cannot believe and cannot refuse. A starting salary significantly higher than he would make elsewhere, promises of large bonuses for passing the bar exam and succeeding on the job, an ascension to partner in as short a time as a decade, a new house with a miniscule mortgage rate, a brand new BMW, and other perks soon have Mitch and his wife Abby settling down in Memphis to enjoy a life of luxury (albeit with hard work on his part).

The firm really seems to care about Mitch and his family, wanting happy marriages with several children, to a degree that has Abby a little suspicious. Mitch passes the bar exam, and life is great, despite the fact he is working eighty hours or more a week.

Then an FBI agent comes to see him, dropping hints of nefarious dealings at the law firm, asking him for help. Thus begins a journey in which Mitch must first decide whether to risk the lives of himself and his wife to violate his legal oaths and sell out the Mafia-controlled law firm, or take his chances, make his millions, and hope the feds dont find enough evidence to eventually land him and all of his coworkers in prison.

It is really an exciting story, as the McDeeres have to deal with and evade both the feds and the Mafia in their efforts to somehow bring down the firm without sacrificing their own lives.

I was totally taken by the change in endings between the movie and the book, and much preferred the book's ending.

I really loved the book and became addicted to Grisham. Unfortunately, his work after The Runaway Jury is quite poor. Even though i followed him for a while after that, his work was less and less appealing. I would not go near a Grisham book these days even if they paid me.

My dad passed this little paperback to me many years ago and that caused me to read everything Grisham has put on the shelves since. It has everything a good novel should in my opinion. Some of his later work, took on a bit too much sermonizing on things like the homeless and capital punishment, but this one is pure storytelling at its best. You see it a lot in these reviews, but this is one of those "can't put it down books." I consumed it over two nights, because I did have to go to work. Some of Grisham's other stuff was really good, but this particular one was my all-time favorite. It launched Grisham's career and rightly so. Even the movie stayed fairly close to the story. That's saying a lot for hollywood. Just outstanding.

This was such a great story, I could not put it down. The author's practical experience really made this a believable read and I hung on every word. I literally could not put it down.

This was my first Grisham book and it certainly did not disappoint. The story begins when Mitch Mcdeere finally finishes his schooling at Harvard Law. He receives job offers from all big law firms on Wall Street, but he also receives a different offer from a firm in Memphis. They offer him a huge salary, a new BMW, and no more school loan expenses, it seems too good to be true, unfortunately it is. Mitch begins to see the darker side of the firm after he gets there. No one has ever left the firm, and some of the lawyers tend to die mysterious deaths. I don't want to ruin the story for anyone, but let me tell you that it will suck you in and leave you breathless. It truly is a must read even if you know nothing about law. Do yourself a favor and go buy the book today and start reading.