The Runaway Jury by John Grisham is a courtroom drama about a fictitious landmark tobacco litigation case In Biloxi, MISS.

The Jury is behaving strangely and they are sequestered.

A tip from a young woman too the tobacco lobbyists suggests she is able to control the outcome of the jury's behavior.

This is Grisham's last decent book--stay away from anything written after 1996--and the twist at the end keeps you on your interest in the book right until it is finally revealed.

I'm about halfway through reading all of Grisham's books now, and this one ranks as one of my favorites if not my favorite. The plotline is very compelling and interesting and keeps moving, even if the behaviors are very unrealistic as other reviewers have noted.

There isn't great characterization here - but let's be honest for a moment, is there really much of that in Grisham? If you're thinking of reading this book, you can only expect so much. The overall story moves along great, has some good intrigue and leaves you wondering what's going to happen and wanting to find out.

Even if some of the characters (notbaly the Judge) don't always see things as they are.... But hey, again, this is Grisham.

I really liked it.

Why do I love it? It is a great plot with a few twists and a good heart. I couldn't tell for awhile the motives behind the main characters, so it was an engaging story. I had not known much about the book beforehand, however. I think it helps if you are not too built up on the story...just know it's very engaging and you end up feeling connected to almost every character.

The book kept me interested, for the most part, but I never accepted the basic premise: that conspiracies, involving large numbers of people, can be maintained for the long haul. There is always the chance, the fear that just one of those inside the plot will "get religion" or sell their story to the tabloids, in which case there is pluperfect hell to pay. Not even the mob is leak proof all the time.

Conspiracies seem to abound with this jury, and the reader is never quite sure who is doing what and to whom. Piles and piles of money are at stake when a tobacco company is sued for selling the cigarettes that allegedly killed a man. If the suit is successful, more suits will surely follow, and more piles and piles of money will be at stake.

This being the case, it is logical to believe that tobacco companies might want to tamper just a tad with the juries. Ditto on Wall Street. But the people who run tobacco companies are not lamebrains, even though they may not be entirely forthcoming with the truth about their product. They know that if they get caught fixing the jury, the jig is up for them. Subtlety and deniability are paramount. But in this book, those two elements seem to be missing, and that's where the plot falls of its own weight.

The characters are nicely drawn. The courtroom feels real enough. The dialogue is right. Not being a lawyer, I can't comment on the legalities, but they sound OK. All I know is that I didn't accept the basic premise, and that is absolutely essential for the enjoyment of a book.

After my husband finsished this book on our vacation in 1996, I took a look at it and couldn't put it down!!! This was the first Grisham novel I ever read. Boy, was I hooked.

(I saw the Pelican Brief at the theatre when it came out; I went with my sister who read the book and said that she was so happy that the movie followed the book so closely. Of course there were subtle differences to benefit the needs of Hollywood.)

So, I waited and waited.... for the Runaway Jury movie to come out... it was so nice to be able to read a book before the movie came out and to be so excited to see how the wonderful book you read is adapted to the big screen! I was not disappointed!

If you haven't read this book and you like suspense, you've got to read it! You won't want to put it down.

If you haven't seen the movie, read the book FIRST!

Enjoy!!!