|
14 von 14 Kunden fanden die folgende Rezension hilfreich:
4.0 von 5 Sternen
What goes around comes around, 14. April 2003
What if you stumbled upon Big Bucks and didn't want to share?Ray Atlee, a professor at the Virginia School of Law, is summarily summoned home to Mississippi by his cancer-ridden father, a former state Chancery Judge. Ol' Dad has never been close to Ray or his younger brother, Forrest. Both call him "Judge". On arrival back at the decaying, family mansion, Ray finds the old man peacefully dead on a sofa. In obvious view is a recently written will naming Ray the estate executor. Both sons are to split the estate's assets even-steven. There isn't much, though, beyond the house and $6,000 in the bank. Mississippi doesn't pay its judges much, and Judge Atlee was famously generous to any and all charities and good causes. So, how about that 3.1 million dollars - cash - stashed in a bookcase behind the sofa, huh? That'll buy a lot of Moon Pies and Yoo-hoo. To call THE SUMMONS a thriller is an overstatement. The action, such as it is, proceeds at a sedate pace as Ray shuttles back and forth between Virginia, Mississippi, and New Jersey and grapples with the questions: 1. Where did the money come from?
2. Is the cash marked, or counterfeit?
3. Should he share it with Forrest?
4. Does anyone else know he has it? Ray decides almost immediately not to declare the money as part the Judge's estate, or share it with his brother, a chronic substance abuser who's been in and out of rehab for twenty years. After all, Forrest would only kill himself with so much wealth, wouldn't he? The reader also learns early on that at least one other is aware of the horde when Ray receives an anonymous note cautioning him not to spend the windfall, and that the IRS is only a phone call away. THE SUMMONS is basically a morality play about the consequences of banal greed. I say banal because Ray is excruciatingly ordinary, and his decisions regarding the cash stash are probably the same ones you or I would make under similar circumstances. Until the last twenty pages or so, I was disinclined to award more than three stars. However, author John Grisham closes with a twist that, while not one that elicits an "Oh, wow!", at least satisfyingly makes the point that what goes around comes around and poetic justice is occasionally served (at least in fiction).
|
Weitere Editionen und Formate anzeigen
Weniger Editionen und Formate anzeigen
von John Grisham
von John Grisham
von John Grisham
von John Grisham
von John Grisham
