The Firm by John Grisham - Audiobook Review

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Title: The Firm
Author: John Grisham
Narrator: Scott Brick
Publisher: Books on Tape
Duration: 17 hours, 15 minutes
Copyright: 2002
Genres: legal, suspense, thriller
Filed in: Audiobook reviews
Review copy provided by Kearney Public Library.

SUMMARY: Mitchell McDeere was an up-and-coming hotshot. In his undergrad years at Kentucky, Mitch was quarterback of the football team and worked full time to support himself, while still managing a 4.0 grade point average. At Harvard Law School, he graduated third in a class of over three hundred. Naturally, he was courted by all the biggest law firms in New York, Washington, and Chicago, and received some very enticing offers.
When Mitch was approached by Bendini, Lambert, and Locke, located in Memphis, Tennessee of all places, he was skeptical, but curious. His curiosity paid off, however, as Mitch soon discovered that the firm was extremely exclusive, offering only one position every other year, extremely wealthy, every past partner had retired a millionaire, and extremely prestigious. Mitch McDeere was hooked from his very first interview, and accepted a starting salary of eighty thousand per year plus bonuses, and all the fringe benefits he had ever dreamed of. During his first several months with Bendini, Lambert, and Locke, the firm was very impressed with Mitch’s productivity and work ethic, and when Mitch passed the bar exam with the top score in his class, the firm knew they had made the right choice.
It wasn’t long, however, before Mitch started to notice some odd things about his new employers. Over the last fifteen years, five of the firm’s partners were killed under suspicious circumstances, and Mitch couldn’t help but notice that whenever he asked questions, the answers he got were vague and the senior partners gave him hostile looks..
Mitch didn’t truly begin to fear for his life, however, until the FBI started contacting him. According to special agent Wayne Terrance, Bendini, Lambert, and Locke has been under investigation for several years. He tells Mitch that the firm is nothing more than a front for a major mafia family in Chicago, and all the FBI needs to put them away, is a man on the inside to provide the hard evidence.
Mitch finds himself caught between a rock and a hard place. If he remains loyal to the firm, he will probably end up indicted along with all the rest. If he cooperates with the FBI, he’ll have to spend the rest of his life in a witness protection program, hiding from the mafia. Either way, his bright future doesn’t seem so bright anymore, but Mitch might have a few tricks up his sleeve. The mafia and the FBI never imagined that a rookie lawyer might have the savvy to outsmart them all.

MY TAKE ON IT: “The Firm” was John Grisham’s second published novel, and in my opinion, one of his finest. Grisham is fond of the David and Goliath scenarios: stories of one lonely lawyer taking on huge corporations, or in this case, the mafia. He also seems to be fond of the young hotshots: bright, hard-working guys fresh out of law school, going up against overwhelming odds. That is all Particularly evident in “The Firm.” Mitch McDeere supported himself through law school and graduated top of his class. He took the job offer that paid the most, as any of us would probably do. But Mitch is basically a good guy, and when the chips were down, he did what he had to do. Most of us will never find ourselves in such extreme circumstances, but we face moral dilemmas like Mitch’s all the time. Mitch showed a great deal of courage and ingenuity to solve his problem, a good lesson for us all.

NARRATOR: I don’t care for Scott Brick as an audiobook narrator. He reads with no feeling at all. In many cases, that can ruin an audiobook, but in the case of “The Firm”, the excellent story was enough to overcome the dryness of the narration.

FINAL WORD: “The Firm” is a great audiobook. If you read only one John Grisham novel, make it this one.

FILM ADAPTATION: “The Firm” was adapted to film in 1993 with a budget of $42 million, and grossed more than $270 million. The film starred Tom Cruise and Holly Hunter, and also featured two of my favorite actors, Gene Hackman and Ed Harris. I listened to the descriptive video version of this movie not too long ago and was pleasantly surprised to hear the voice of one of my favorite audiobook narrators, David Strathairn in the role of Mitch McDeere’s brother, Ray., Strathairn narrated quite a few of Louis L’Amour’s audiobooks. This was an excellent film and I highly recommend it.

CHECK OUT THESE OTHER AUDIOBOOK REVIEWS:
The Pelican Brief by John Grisham (Audiobook review)
The Rainmaker by John Grisham (Audiobook Review)
The Partner by John Grisham (Audiobook Review)

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Get "The Firm" by John Grisham (Unabridged Audiobook) from Amazon.com.

Interested in the movie?
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This audiobook review is based on the unabridged audiobook.
Audiobook review by Steven Brandt
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