Grisham's Latest Gets Back to Basics

M. Scott Morris - Mississippi Daily Journal

It's a landmark week for best-selling author John Grisham. He turned 54 on Sunday and his 22nd book, "The Associate," comes out Thursday.

It's also a landmark year for Reed's Gumtree Bookstore, which was among the first to host a signing for Grisham's debut, "A Time to Kill." That was 20 years ago.

On Tuesday, Grisham signed 2,000 copies of his new book on the second floor of Reed's. A cake honoring his birthday and the anniversary of "A Time to Kill" waited on a nearby table.

"When Time to Kill' came out 20 years ago, most bookstores would not have signings. I was turned away from a lot of stores, which is not unusual," he said. "There were a handful of stores in this area that not only said yes, but enthusiastically had book parties, and Gumtree was one of them. So it's always been easy to come back to Tupelo."

Another return His latest legal thriller, "The Associate," is set in a New York law firm, where a young lawyer gets blackmailed into spying on his employer.

Jack Reed Sr., Reed's chairman of the board, said, "He's gone back to what made him a star."

Grisham promised no politics, no subplot and "no socially redeeming value," and the "pages are supposed to fly by."

Reed said Tupelo readers have already responded, though the book won't be available until Thursday.

"The economy, of course, has gone to the dogs," Reed said, "but our pre-sales on this book are more than they were last year."

"The Associate" is available for $27.95, slightly more than the $18.95 that a first edition of "A Time to Kill" fetched when it came out. With 5,000 copies in the first printing, the value of those books has gone up.

"I've bought a few over the years," Grisham said. "It's been a couple of years since I bought one. I'd buy one today if it's in good shape."

In the right condition, one of those early copies would fetch between $3,500 and $4,000, he said.

"I've got four boxes of 12 each that have never been opened. Those are buried in the backyard," he said. "I've got another 20 or 30 that I've always had but they're out of the box, and probably another 20 that I've purchased over the years. Probably 100."

Grisham said he's saving the books for "grandchildren, and every now and then, somebody really special qualifies for a book, but they've got to be special."

Expect the future to include more books and more trips to Northeast Mississippi for Grisham.

"This is home territory. I still have my home in Oxford," said Grisham, who also has a home in Virginia. "I grew up in Southaven. Even beyond that, we lived a year in Ripley when I was 11 or 12 years old. When you get to this part of the world, this will always feel like home."

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