John Grisham Quotes
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Twenty years on, the books are still fun to write and I've still got lots of stories I want to tell, mainly about social injustice and people chewed up by the system.
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I have learned not to read reviews. Period. And I hate reviewers. All of them, or at least all but two or three. Life is much simpler ignoring reviews and the nasty people who write them. Critics should find meaningful work.
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I wrote a lot of 'A Time to Kill' at the State Capitol in Jackson, Miss., hiding in little committee rooms, killing time waiting for legislation to come to the floor.
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Best-selling writers should go to bookstores to say thanks to the booksellers, to meet fans, sign autographs, sign books, talk, whatever.
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And that's the mission of The Innocence Project in New York, is to exonerate people who have been wrongfully convicted, and also work from a policy angle with Congress and state legislatures to prevent future wrongful convictions.
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I used to walk in a bookstore and see all these books on the walls. And I would say, 'Who wants to hear from me? What do I have to add to all of this?'
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I sat down with a yellow legal pad and began writing 'A Time to Kill.' Had no idea what I was doing. It became, over a period of several years, a secret little hobby nobody knew about except my wife, because she was reading chapter by chapter.
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Most men cannot write good sex. I tried one time years ago and showed it to my wife, and she felt like laughing.
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There are so many colorful characters in Florida. There's a lot of money, development - not all of it good - and corruption.
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There are always issues on the front page that need to be explored.
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We have the crime of the century every six months. So for people like me who enjoy, you know, taking these stories and writing about them, the material is endless.
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My name became a brand, and I'd love to say that was the plan from the start. But the only plan was to keep writing books. And I've stuck to that ever since.
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Writing's still the most difficult job I've ever had - but it's worth it.
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That's the best way to practice law, is writing about it and not having to be in the courtroom!
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Nobody wants to read about the honest lawyer down the street who does real estate loans and wills. If you want to sell books, you have to write about the interesting lawyers - the guys who steal all the money and take off. That's the fun stuff.
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I was a lawyer for 10 years - a short time, but it molded me into who I am. My clients were little people fighting big corporations, so it was a natural thing to not only represent the little guy but also to pull for him - it's the American way.
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Every morning I wake at 6am or 6.30am, champing at the bit.
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I'm not in favor of the death penalty. But I'm in favor of locking these people away in maximum security units where they can never get out. They can never escape. They can never be paroled. Lock the bad ones away. But you gotta rethink everybody else.
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When you work at street level you never know who's going to walk through your door.
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I'm not good at raising money. I don't like to raise money. It's been my experience that when I ask someone for money, it's not long before they return the favor.
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It's hard to read good fiction when I am writing, because if it is really good I catch myself sort of inadvertently imitating a great writer.
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I've tried writing with music on, but I find it distracting.
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Quite often I can be in a bookshop, standing beneath a great big picture of myself and paying for a book with a credit card clearly marked John Grisham, yet no one recognises me. I often say I'm a famous author in a country where no one reads.
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I give off rather mixed messages about the law. On the one hand, I can honestly say I don't miss working in a law office. On the other hand I do enjoy watching the law and while the profession may have its problems, I have sold zillions of books out of magnifying them.