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BM:It’s the same for me. I just
love the courtroom, whether as a
lawyer or a judge. I love the hu-
man drama that plays out within
the room.
JG:If I’m reading a legal thriller
or procedural about a courtroom
drama, I can usually tell pretty
quickly if the writer is a lawyer
who has spent time in a cour-
troom. If they’re not, there’s just
not the edge of authenticity that
a real lawyer brings to the de-
scription, to the tone, the setting,
the dialogue, the conflict. Most
lawyers are pretty good writers
and storytellers because we see
so much. Rarely can lawyers put
both those together, but when
we do, the stories are very au-
thentic.
BM:I, too, have read books where
the courtroom scenes just fall
flat, sometimes for technical er-
rors, but sometimes just because
the voice isn’t there. ven though
you’re writing fiction, you have
to be authentic.
JP:Sometimes fiction can feel so
real and affect me even more
than non-fiction. How do you get
your story ideas?
JG:Probably all of them have
some kernel of truth – maybe
something that happened to me.
But I do a lot of reading of news
magazines and newspapers. I’m
not necessarily looking for sto-
ries, but I like to read about is-
sues involving lawyers, the law,
prisons, capital punishment,
wrongful conviction. It’s not al-
ways pleasurable, but it’s always
compelling.The Reckoninggoes
back to a story I heard someone
tell æ0 years ago – I think the sto-
ry is true, but I’m not sure. or
some reason, I kept it for æ0 years
and then embellished it a whole
lot and wrote the novel. Writers
are always on the patrol for an
idea or a story, a face, a word, a
bit of dialogue or a cool setting.
BM:I’m an amateur compared to
you, John, but I find myself com-
pelled by the stories popping up
in the paper about some justice
situation, and maybe you can see
some of the characters there and
you take off from there.
JP:Do you find the genre has
changed since you began writing,
John? Are people looking for
something different today when
they’re reading crime or mystery
novels?
JG:The genre is pretty sleepy.
Thirty years ago, Scott Turow
publishedPresumed Innocentand
that book just electrified the
genre, because it’s such a beauti-
fully written, smart book and it
did so well. There were other
people writing before Scott, but I
didn’t pay any attention to them.
He inspired me to finish my first
novel. It didn’t work, but when
The Firmtook off in 1991, I was
really motivated to stick with the
legal thriller. But the book I’m
writing this morning, in my opin-
ion, is the same that I’ve written
over the last æ0 years.
BV:I also foundPresumed Inno-
centso compelling. I think it’s
easier today because people are
used to and love courtroom
scenes. The usual comment I get
aboutFull Disclosureis that they
loved the last third of the book,
which was all about the court-
room. It’s hard to write it, be-
cause you start with Day 1 and
Day 2, and trials tend to take a
while, and I thought people
wouldn’t be able to follow it –
maybe it’ll be too technical. But
they loved it. I was told that
some Canadian criminal law pro-
fessors are using the book to il-
lustrate how trials could go and
to generate discussion on some
of the ethical and other issues
that arise. So I think the genre
has come into its own because
people are interested in the law
and in some of the issues. I
haven’t started my second one
yet, but I’m going to be looking
at some sort of cutting-edge issue
where people have different
views and try to build the book
around that.
JG:Judge, you’re right. It is ex-
tremely difficult to write court-
room scenes without boring the
reader. If you watch a trial, there
are some dramatic moments, but
for so much of it, for lack of a
better term, it’s dead time, where
not much is happening, especial-
ly in civil cases. It will put you to
sleep. But for a courtroom thrill-
er, you gotta keep the pages turn-
ing. Dou also have to keep it plau-
sible. It’s extremely difficult to
tell the complete story accurately
in a courtroom without boring
the reader.
BM:I’m glad I’m not the only one.
JP:So how do you deal with that?
How do you make sure the pac-
ing is right?
JG:If I’m worried the scene coulddrag a bit, I constantly read and
reread it, and read the chapter
before – it’s a constant process of
making sure the story is moving.
And my wife reads it. She has a
real knack for pacing and plot-
ting. My editor in *ew Dork also
reads it. I listen to both of them
all the time. The one criticism
that bothers me is when one of
them says a section is dragging.
BM:It was a learning experience
for me, because I had a pivotal
scene the whole book turns on
and I did it in three pages, which
I thought was good, because any
lawyer would use æ0 pages. The
editor told me to get it down to
one paragraph and I thought,
how can I do this? Det, I did. The
other thing I found was that dia-
logue was really important and
keeping it smart and rapid
seemed to help me keep the pag-
es turning and keep everything
alive.
JG:Dialogue, when you use it
properly, can really turn the pag-
es. Dou can have a little bit of ex-
planation, especially when
you’re dealing with the law, but
you can’t do too much. And
that’s where lawyers get into
trouble – they feel compelled to
share their vast knowledge of the
law with their readers. That’s
why lawyers can’t make it as
writers – they talk too much.
JP:John, you were talking earlier
about how much you read. What
do you read when you’re writing?
JG:When I’m writing fiction, I
don’t read fiction. If I’m reading a
great novel, I’ll catch myself us-
ing sentences that are longer or
shorter, or maybe a bigger vocab-
ulary – just things I wouldn’t nor-
mally do. But I have to read a lot
of non-fiction for research. or
this book, I’m writing about for-
profit prisons in the U.S., over-
crowding, mass incarceration,
sentencing disparities, wrongfulconvictions. I have to know what
I’m talking about.
BM:I’m always reading, but like
John, I don’t read a lot of fiction
when I’m doing this. What I am
doing is delving into all sorts of
things that sometimes I wouldn’t
ordinarily read about.
JP:Do you find it hard to get into
a writer’s schedule after 0 years
as a judge?
BM:I write when I can, but I love
to get stretches of time, so I’ll do
it at my cottage or someplace
where usual things don’t inter-
fere. I started this just as I was
finishing up being a judge. So, I
got up at :æ0 in the morning to
do it and had to stop at seven
and then I went to court. That
was hard. Ideally, I love to just
start in the morning and go till at
least noon and then maybe shut
the door in the afternoon, read a
bit of poetry and come back re-
freshed the next morning.
JP:What poetry do you read?
BM:Oh, all sorts. Wordsworth,
Deats, T.S. liot and lots of others.
I just find that reading poetry is
great because it makes you real-
ize how careful you have to be
with words.
JP:What about you, John? Do you
have a routine for when you’re
writing?
JG:Much like the judge – and I
think it’s true for those of us who
had demanding careers before
we were able to write full-time –
we had to do it early in the morn-
ing, and that’s how I wrote my
first two books. *ow, I start at
seven and write till about 11 or 12
every day. I start writing a book
on January 1st of every year. I
give myself six months to finish
it–sobyJuly1–andthat’s the
writing season for me. Once I
write for four straight hours, my
brain is pretty well mush. Some
days are very productive–agood
day for me is 1,000 words. A slowday, if I’m researching, is 02
words. I don’t give a lot of advice
to aspiring writers, but I have
said several times, you gotta find
your time of day. It’s best if you
go to one place and have one
routine and one spot. Scott Tu-
row wrotePresumed Innocent
while riding the train into Chica-
go every day. I have a buddy,
reg Iles, in *atchez, Miss., who
starts writing at midnight every
night. Whatever it takes. ind
your one spot and your one
hour.
JP:So, do the two of you watch
TV thrillers or crime shows and
has that impacted your thinking
of the crime and mystery genre?
BM:*o. I don’t watch it.
JG:I don’t watch much television.
I’ve seenCSIandLaw and Order,
but the legal stuff is not always
plausible and I get really frustrat-
ed when I see something that’s
not right. It shows a lot about our
culture that the most popular
shows on television are about
police and crime and lawyers
and courts. We have an insatiable
appetite for those types of sto-
ries. And thank od for that, be-
cause it spills over into fiction,
and that’s where the market is.
JG:I got a question for the judge.
Dou haven’t started your second
book. What are you waiting on?
BM:Well, I’ve been writing a
memoir, but it’s done. So I’m go-
ing to start very shortly. But I’ll
take inspiration from you. I’ll
start reading the papers and clip-
ping things out.
JP:What about you, John? Do you
ever get tired of writing or think
you’re done?
JG:*o, I have so many stories I
want to write. ven now, after 0
books, I just want to write. There
are a lot of ideas I want to ex-
plore, so I want to stay healthy
enough to be writing books 1
years from now.Crime:Courtoomscenesoftenfallflatifnotwrittenbylawyers,Grishamsays
FROMR1BeverleyMcLachlin,left,andJohnGrishambothcitePresumedInnocentbyScottTurowasabookthatsparkedaninterestinthecrime/legalfiction
genrewhenitwaspublishedmorethan30yearsago.LEFT:FREDLUM/THEGLOBEANDMAIL;RIGHT:FLAVIOLOSCALZO/ANSAVIAASSOCIATEDPRESS