After reading a lot of John Grisham when I was younger I stopped for a while, and only recently I have been dropping in now and then to read some of the books that I missed. Especially his recent stuff has been really good – written lean and moving at a brisk pace through the stories.
When I go back to some of his earlier books (like this one) you can see where his pacing needed work, and where he started finding his targets.
This book takes place largely in Italy, and I remembered that he came back to Italy in a big way later on in Playing for Pizza, one of my favorites of his. While reading this book it felt like he was just relating his own personal experiences in Italy (except for the hit squads and spy cameras). The language lessons went on and on, and the cultural notes seemed like they didn’t add a whole lot to the story, although I’m sure Italian readers really liked to see them.
The tail end of the book feels more like a thriller and has a kind of traditional ending, but I was hoping for more of the main character on the run. Maybe there is a book genre out there with the main character trying to hide and make a new life – hmm… I‘ll do some research.
Next I’m reading The Last Emperox by John Scalzi to wrap up that trilogy.
