Bleachers

source : Amazon.com
author : John Grisham

With Bleachers John Grisham departs again from the legal thriller to experiment with a character-driven tale of reunion, broken high school dreams, and missed chances. While the book falls short of the compelling storytelling that has made Grisham a bestselling author, it is nonetheless a diverting novella that succeeds as light fiction.

The story centers on the impending death of the Messina Spartans' football coach Eddie Rake. One of the most victorious coaches in high school football history, Rake is a man both loved and feared by his players and by a town that relishes his 13 state titles. The hero of the novel is Neely Crenshaw, a former Rake All-American whose NFL prospects ended abruptly after a cheap shot to the knees. Neely has returned home for the first time in years to join a nightly vigil for Rake at the Messina stadium. Having wandered through life with little focus since his college days, he struggles to reconcile his conflicted feelings towards his former coach, and he assays to rekindle love in the ex-girlfriend he abandoned long ago. For Messina and for Neely, the homecoming offers the prospect of building a life after Rake.

Physically a narrow book, Bleachers is a modest fiction in many respects. The emotional scope is akin to that of a short story, with a single-minded focus on explorations of nostalgia and regret. The dialogue, especially that of Neely's friend Paul Curry, is sometimes wooden as characters recall Messina history in paragraphs that were perhaps better left to the narrator. But Grisham has otherwise written a well-made, entertaining--if a bit sentimental--story. --Patrick O'Kelley

Reader's review:
You've read Bleachers, John Grisham's newest bestseller, many times in a thousand other books, many of them better than this somewhat undersized novel. The general atmosphere of high school football which consumes an entire town has been told better in Friday Night Lights. The harsh treatment of young football hopefuls by dictator-coaches was brought into cruel focus in the non-fiction Junction Boys, about Bear Bryant and a legendary sweatbox training camp for his players during his first summer at Texas A&M. And, of course, keeping vigil for an impending death has been literally done to death many times, notably in Edward Albee's Pulitzer-Prize winning play All Over. So, why read Bleachers? Because, once again, the fresh, newspaper-like quality of John Grisham's minimalist prose draws us into the story and makes us love and, in our own ways, relate to all the characters, saint and sinner alike. Here, we have Neely Crenshaw, the gifted ex-quarterback who can't forgive Coach Eddie Rake for one moment of lockerroom abuse; Cameron, the ex-girlfriend whom he jilted in high school and who cannot fully forgive him; Mal, the ex-player turned lawman who has his own chilling tale to tell; and finally, the ex-teammates who meet spontanously in the bleachers of the old stadium awaiting news of the coach's impending death. They meet shyly, hesitantly at first, then start to drink and tell stories while listening to a tape broadcast of their most famous game. (Their shared stories as they relive this game are the undisputed high point of the book.) Yes, we even have the memorial service in which our ex-quarterback and (believe it or not) our dearly departed coach get the chance to have a final say. We know the outcome of this story as surely as Friday night football in the South. Why retell it? Because it is a very touching and human story and like all the best stories, deserves to be told again and again. (Besides, it'a a short book, and quick readers will finish it in a matter of hours.) In short, a good reaffirmation of life, the human spirit, and football in all it's glory.  -- chris messey Food Czar

Frankly Bleachers left flat, tired and uninterested, kind of like watching a high school football game where the opponent is trouncing your team and the only sensation left is the hardness of the bleachers.
I wonder what Grisham is up to? Where are the legal dramas that made him a keeper and a best seller? I can only hope that court will be in session again soon and that Grisham will leave these non-legal dramas to other authors more fitted to the genre. -- Douglas McAllister 

Unless you really love football and understand the ins and outs of this game, don't waste your time on Bleachers. The story line gets lost in all the game jargon and the characters are stereotypes of small town folk. The ex football stars lament their former glory days while criminals and cops share a beer together reminising on thier teen years. They come across as fake, dull and I did not care in the least what became of any of them. Grisham's leading man, a former high school football star, who lost his big chances when he was injured in college, returns to his small town after the death of his former coach. He is arrogant, complacent and unlikable. Apparently he has come home to face his past demons but Grisham spends so much time describing technical football plays that I'm not sure exactly what those demons were aside from the fact he did not like his coach and still felt jilted about losing out on a career with the NFL.
This is not typical Grisham fare by a long shot and if you are expecting any thrills you will be dissappointed. I applaud that Grisham is willing to take a risk and try new things; I really enjoyed his efforts with the The Painted House and Skipping Christmas. But where Grisham scored with those novels he drops the ball here. -- Bonnie L. Taylor

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