Fans of the bestselling Grisham will be pleased to note that he is once more on Firm ground: his latest legal thriller offers a clever, compelling plot coupled with two singular protagonists sure to elicit readers' empathy. Eleven-year-old Mark Sway, taking his kid brother for a smoke behind their Memphis trailer park, witnesses the suicide of a lawyer ``driven crazy'' by a lethal secret. Before he dies, the man confides to Mark where the body of a recently murdered U.S. senator lies buried, and the game's afoot. Trailed by the police, the FBI and assorted Mafia types (the deceased politico was the victim of ``a successful New Orleans street thug''), Mark retains--for one dollar--the services of Reggie Love, a 50ish female lawyer. This uncommon attorney-client relationship adds an affecting, unusually humanistic layer to the novel's tension-filled events. Mark, raised by a divorced mother and wise beyond his years, thinks chiefly in terms of movies and TV; Reggie, a street-smart survivor of an acrimonious divorce, is often unsure whether to hug or slug her precocious client. True to form, Grisham employs just enough foreshadowing to keep the suspense rolling (``Neither of them could know that . . . ''), and propels his action at the requisite breakneck pace. Occasional plot improbabilities and stylistic quibbles--a few fuzzy characterizations; overstatement of already obvious points; Mark's sporadic adult phraseology--will not deter readers from enjoying a rousing read. 950,000 first printing; Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club main selections; Reader's Digest Condensed Book selection. (Mar.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

/*STARRED REVIEW*/ The newest member of the sure-fire-number-one-bestseller club is going to score big again. For the author of The Firm and The Pelican Brief here merges two tried-and-true genres--the legal thriller and the boys' adventure yarn. His hero is 11-year-old Mark Sway, who, with his 8-year-old brother, witnesses a Mafia-defending shyster's suicide, unfortunately not before he's learned why the creep's offing himself--a secret that one Barry the Blade in particular is not going to let the lawyer live with. Now that Mark knows it, he's in danger, too, and not only from the bad guys. A politically ambitious U.S. attorney (one of that new breed of villain, the Reagan appointee) is hot on Barry's case, and he'll pull any string, ruin any life, to get ahead. So the cops and the FBI start coming down hard on Mark. But Mark's a bright, resourceful kid, and he finds an attorney, Reggie Love, a former society matron who survived a horrible divorce, went to law school, and became a specialist in defending children. Together they make a sterling team, although, really, this is Mark's book and one helluva good read, not to mention the movie possibilities. If Macaulay (Home Alone) Culkin can stave off a growth spurt and a voice change long enough, here's his chance to make it as a "serious" actor. (Reviewed Feb. 1, 1993)038542471XRay Olson

Grisham's latest opens with a neat hook into the reader's jaw- -and the tension never wavers--as the author strives for a knockout suspenser with echoes of Mark Twain and Robert Louis Stevenson--or at least the reader can't help weighing what he's reading against the darker plots that enmesh Huck Finn and Jim Hawkins. Instead of pirates, though, 11-year-old Mark Sway is thrown among lawyers and murderers. Mark, a great follower of L.A. Law, becomes ``the client'' after he witnesses the suicide of a drunken Mafia lawyer. Before the lawyer dies, he tries to take Mark with him, holding the boy prisoner while the Cadillac they sit in fills with carbon dioxide. As he's fading, the lawyer reveals to Mark the whereabouts of the body of a Louisiana senator. The senator was murdered by Mafia thug Barry ``the Blade'' Muldanno, then buried under concrete in the lawyer's garage. Mark escapes death but now holds a secret so deadly that Barry the Blade is ready to waste him. He's also wanted by the feds because Barry's going on trial for the senator's murder--but there's no body, and so the feds have a weak case. Mark retains 52-year-old Reggie Love, an abused divorcée, to help him keep shut about the body's whereabouts. If it's known that he knows--and the hoods and feds suspect him mightily--he and his family will never have a safe moment again. The story is set in Memphis, then moves to New Orleans, but both backgrounds are sketchy. The strongest scene features three mildly funny goons in the middle of the night trying to...well, enough. Mark is too smart by half, rather than wise like Huck; dialogue slips into exposition; and Grisham goes for the tear ducts at tale's end, but presses too hard. None of this matters. In the movie, the obligatory face-out between Barry the Blade and Mark will take place, bet on it, though Grisham avoids the confrontation. (Literary Guild Dual Selection for May)

YA-- While sneaking into the woods to smoke forbidden cigarettes, preteen brothers Mark and Ricky find a lawyer committing suicide in his car. Mark tries to save the man but is instead grabbed by him and told the location of the body of a murdered U. S. senator--a murder of which the lawyer's Mafia-connected client is accused. Witnessing the successful suicide sends Ricky into shock and Mark into a web of lies, half-truths, and finally into refusal to tell the confided secret to the police. Mark accidentally but fortuitously hires a lawyer, Reggie Love, who steers him through a maze of FBI agents, legal proceedings, judges, ambitious lawyers, and hit men. Love's 11-year-old, street-smart client defies the judicial system to protect himself and his family. This thriller is unique in its theme and in its suspense mixed with humor. A sure ``all-night'' read.-- Katherine Fitch, Lake Braddock Secondary School, Burke, VA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.