John Grisham's The Guardian: A review

Grisham has done it yet again!

I started reading John Grisham’s novels when I was introduced to “The Rainmaker” by one of my friends in my junior college. I always aspired to become a lawyer and so, Grisham’s book appealed to me since he is a Legal Thriller author. It’s in the name, he writes thriller which are hugely based on law and the legal system. Ranging from “The Firm” which was the ultimate bestseller to “The Chamber” which portrays death penalty scenarios to “The Pelican Brief” another of this ultimate best seller turned movie to the latest of his work “The Guardians” Grisham has managed to create something extraordinary every time he publishes a novel and every novel of his is in itself the best seller and the most loved novel.

You cannot have enough of Grisham!

The Guardians is Grisham’s 40th novel. He first published in 1989 and went straight to the #1 on New York Times Bestseller List with his first book “A time to kill”. In his life away from his writing desk, Grisham serves on the board of directors of The Innocence Project. This brings me, finally, to the book at hand, The Guardians, which is inspired by a true story.

In this book, a former Episcopal Priest and lawyer named Cullen Post works for an organisation called “The Guardian Ministries” that looks into court transcripts and personal letters from convicts to determine if they are wrongfully convicted for a crime they didn’t commit. This organisation works completely pro bono. If the organisation believes without a doubt that the potential client is innocent, they will do everything they possibly can to free an innocent person by pushing for a new trial.

Quincy Miller, a black man, has been in prison for 22 years for the murder of a white lawyer in a small town of Florida – a crime which he claims he has not committed. A young lawyer was murdered and suspicion quickly turned to Quincy pulling the trigger. During the trial, a fellow inmate at the prison tells the jury that Quincy Miller confessed to doing the crime to him and his ex wife claims that he owned several guns, both of these facts being false. A witness lies on stand about seeing Miller running away from the crime scene. Miller swears that all of these facts are false, that he doesn’t own a gun, that he wasn’t anywhere near the area that night, and that the key piece of evidence that later disappeared under suspicious circumstances was planted by the police and the prosecution.

It is highly unlikely and hard to believe that so many people, including a fraud forensics will be involved in the miscarriage of justice but Post believes that Miller is innocent and begins to dig into his case and the events that happened on that fateful night.

Post’s efforts to find out exculpatory evidence in a cold case put him in grave danger of his life because, for one thing, a shady drug cartel is involved very closely in the murder. In the dead centre of this novel, our hero Post hears a cautionary and a spine chilling tale from one of the survivors of the brutal killings done by this drug cartel in the middle of a big jungle. Post acknowledges that most of the prisoners who contact The Guardian Ministries are in fact guilty but it’s the thousands of others who have become his vocation.

“It’s fairly easy to convict an innocent man and virtually impossible to exonerate one.” Post reminds this to one of his potential clients. The Guardian Ministries has so far exonerated eight prisoners and Quincy Miller might just be the ninth one. His fate is dependent on the relentless re-investigation conducted by Post with the help of jailhouse snitches, witnesses who gave false testimony years ago and his colleagues. What he uncovers is page turning! Post faces danger both human and supernatural in his titanic efforts to turn Justice Denied into Justice Delayed for Quincy Miller. The climax reminds me of the countless Hardy Boys adventures when Post and his colleague break into a boarded up haunted house, climb up into a dark attic and unearth a clue that will completely decide Miller’s case for him and while doing so discover a human skeleton with decayed organs in one of the closets of the house. Time is very crucial as the drug cartel is right on their heels trying to kill them. A jail attack lands Quincy Miller in a hospital with a severe life death battle and the case gets even more complicated.

Every page of the book holds suspense that you just cannot escape! Post is one of the most driven and likeable loner whom Grisham should definitely bring back again! The Guardians have a lot of work left to do.

This book thrilled me with the concepts of truth, miscarriage of justice and what they mean in realities of the legal world and the harsh reality of how the legal system works. I was unfamiliar with the concept of an Innocence Lawyer and I have come to realise how important that job can be. The Guardians certainly makes one visit their moral conscious again, which is very much needed in this Legal world where anything is possible and everything is grey! This books makes you think and appreciate the world that we think is, and it takes you on a ride into a system that will do anything to get convictions out of every criminal trial, where there are career criminals and where the truth and integrity and morality have no chance of survival (literally).

“This can be a dirty business. We are forced to deal with witnesses who have lied, police who have fabricated evidence, experts who have mislead juries, and prosecutors who have suborned perjury. We, the good guys, often find that getting our hands dirty is the only way to save our clients.”

Just a brilliant piece of art and worth every second and minute you spend reading it. Truly captivating.

The Reader's Den Ratings:

After reading this immensely captivating, page turning thriller, I find it the perfect book for anyone who is thirsty for a mystery! It is most definitely on my top list of the books I have read recently.

9/10

Highly Recommended

We at The Reader's Den hope you are safe wherever you are and until our next review/post is up, keep reading!