THE PELICAN BRIEF 8/10

The book starts with the murder of two US Supreme court judges by an unknown killer. A beautiful smart young woman named Darby Shaw who is a law student writes a brief about the cases suggesting who might have have actually got the judges murdered. She doesn't realize the seriousness of her report until her boyfriend, her own professor is killed by a bomb kept in the car in which she was supposed to be travelling too. She had given the brief to the professor who in turn showed it to his best friend, an FBI lawyer. The brief then gets circulated amongst several powerful people including the president of the United States himself. During this circulation the brief lands itself into some wrong hands who get intimidated by it and now set out to kill Derby. The rest of the novel is actually about how Darby tries to escape the multiple attempts on her life with the help of an intelligent reporter, Gray Grantham to finally make a complete revelation about the entire conspiracy that finally lead to the murders.

The Pelican Brief is my first John Grisham book. I am a person who likes to read simple books with not too many complications and not too many things to remember. So I have never had much appeal for science fiction and courtroom drama novels. I had heard a lot about Grisham but never really read any of his books. I knew he mostly wrote legal thrillers and there were also some movies made based on his books. A friend, another avid bibliophile like me gave me some novels which she said were a must read. Pelican Brief was one among them and now after reading it, I have no regrets. The story was very interesting from the beginning. I don't think there was any point where I felt bored or disinterested because the story line and particularly the narration style is very gripping. There were certain unexpected twists and turns as well. I thought the author did not make the story complicated and was very gripping. The amazing thing about the book is the fact that most of the book is nothing but just a chase between the protagonist and the goons who are set to kill her, but it is written so well that you get hooked on to the chase and want Darby to live so badly !! You really feel for Darby when she is not able to trust anybody and she is also unable to take help from her family or friends as it might put then under risk. It had been a long time since I read a thriller and Pelican Brief was definitely a great read.

I liked the environmental twist which the story had which was completely unexpected. Just makes me realize the large amounts of money that is actually involved in some of the natural resources sector such as oil and gas and mining of minerals which attracts greed among other emotions. The environmental impact assessment is actually a very useful tool that helps to analyze the extent of damage on the environment if a project such as construction of a dam or a power station or even drilling for oil and natural gas is given a go ahead. I think it is one of the strong pillars of sustainable development but sadly, due to the money involved in such huge projects it leaves a lot of scope for corruption like the way its shown in the book.