Boek
Summons, The
| Auteur | John Grisham |
| Eerste Uitgave | 2002 |
| Uitgave | 2002 |
| Uitgeverij | Book Club Associates |
| Vorm | roman |
| Taal | Engels |
| Bladzijden | 341 bladzijden |
| Gelezen | 2005-02-13 |
| Score | 8/10 |
Inhoud
Ray Atlee is a professor of law at the University of Virginia. He's forty-three, newly single, an still enduring the aftershocks of a surprise dicorce. He has a younger brother, Forrest, who redefines the notion of a family's black sheep.
And he has a father, a very sick old man who lives alone in the ancestral home in Clanton, Mississippi. He is known to all as Judge Atlee, a beloved and powerful official who has towered over local law and politics for forty years. No longer on the bench, the Judge has withdrawn to the Atlee mansion and become a recluse.
With the end in sight, Judge Atlee issues a summons for both sons to return home to Clanton, to discuss the details of his estate. It is typed by the judge himself, on his handsome old stationery, and gives the date and time for Ray and Forrest to appear in his study.
Ray reluctantly heads south, to his hometown, to the place where he grew up, which he prefers now to avoid. But the family meeting does not take place. The judge dies too soon, and in doing so leaves behind a shocking secret known only to Ray.
And perhaps someone else.
Bespreking
A nicely paced legal thriller
Judge Atlee, a retired and highly respected official, has reached the terminal phase of his battle against a scourging cancer. Seemingly to arrange what must happen when he dies, he summons his two sons to return home to Clantons and discuss the details of the estate. But when Ray Atlee, the son who became professor of law at the University of Virginia, arrives it is too late: his father has died.
While cleaning out the estate, Ray stumbles upon a few cardboard boxes filled with money, over $3 million in cash. Not knowing what to do with it he decides to hide it until the source of this fortune is clear. The younger brother, Forrest, is kept in the dark because sharing the money would clearly become his death, knowing his history as a drug addict. Ray thinks that no one knows the secret, but this is about to change dramatically.
What starts of as a "what if?" story in which a man discovered a fortune without knowing the source, quickly changes into an exploration into the past of an old judge. The red line throughout the story is to discover why that money was stashed away so secretly. Grisham exploits this element very craftily and works consistently towards an exciting denouement. Sadly enough the return of Grisham to the genre of the legal thriller could have been a little bit more spectacular. In The Summons no loophole of the law is being investigated, no major ethical theme is addressed and above all no complex conspiracy is revealed. Nevertheless the pace of the narrative is fast and the reader will find enough clues to want to continue reading throughout the night.