The Book: Ford County, by John Grisham
The Story: This is a series of short stories all set in Ford County- a really rural area of Mississippi.
Some of the stories are funny (the first story, “Blood Drive” made me laugh out loud), some are deeply touching (the last story, “Funny Boy” was a tear jerker), and most just talk about some nugget of Southern life.
There isn’t a real tie between the stories, besides the fact that they take place in the same county. Several of the books have lawyers or criminals as the main character, which is right up John Grisham’s alley.
What I Thought: I picked this one up because I kind of have a thing for short stories. I like the idea of a compact story that I can read in a short sitting. I also think that a lot of short stories are kind of crap. I hate when they just seem like one chapter plucked out of a whole book. What I’m saying is this: I’ve read a lot of short stories and I can tell good from bad. These were good.
Most of the stories were around 40 or 50 pages and John Grisham managed to really get some great plot and character development packed into that many pages and it was completely impressive. I loved the setting. While it didn’t feel completely “modern,” it did feel real and I found myself picturing the scenes happening in the late 50’s or early 60’s. Not sure if this is what he intended at all, but that’s where it took me most of the time.
The other thing that struck me about this collection is that, while there were a couple that stuck with me more than others, there were no duds. I didn’t skim one page and each story really sat with me.
I don’t know if these are story-lines that didn’t work out as full novels, but I kept thinking that they would work as something larger. Don’t know if there are any plans there, but I’d be open to read “expanded” versions of almost all of these.
Conclusion: Don’t write this off just because it is John Grisham. I know that he’s fairly lame and overdone, but this story collection is a whole different thing. He did a good thing here and I’d recommend it to anyone.