Camino Island

Camino Island

John Grisham

If you're looking for a sure-fire quick read that's immersive and hard to put down, an escapist adventure, there are very few authors more dependable than John Grisham. His characters are well-developed, the plots are interesting and complicated but easy to follow and they come to a satisfying conclusion.

Having said all that I admit that I haven't opened a John Grisham novel since Sycamore Row a couple years ago but that book just reminded me of what I've been missing.

Camino Island, Grisham's second-last published novel (his latest is The Rooster Bar) fits the bill completely. Set in the world of fictional small book-sellers and collectors of first editions, possibly an area that Grisham is somewhat familiar with, the story opens with the outrageous heist of original priceless but well-insured F. Scott Fitzgerald manuscripts from a deep-below-the-surface-of-the-earth vault of a Princeton Library. 

Mercer Mann, a young aspiring writer with a lack of both funds and ideas for her next novel soon finds herself involved in a plan to retrieve these invaluable manuscripts that are thought to be in the possession of a small bookseller on  fictitious Camino Island just off the northeast coast of Florida, an island she is familiar with from her childhood of summers spent there with her beloved grandmother. 

Mercer gets to know some of the members of the Camino Island writing community, finds that she likes them very much and is torn about "spying" on them to find out details of the possible presence of the valued stolen goods. 

As I closed the book's last pages I felt like I too had spent some weeks in the Florida sunshine, strolling the beaches in the heat and at dusk, watching for nesting loggerhead turtles. It was a get-away for sure. Recommended.

You might also be interested that in June 2017 John Grisham embarked on his first book tour in 25 years, quickly followed in November by his second book tour in 25 years. The events are hosted by (mostly) small bookstores across the country and at each, Grisham has invited another author or two to join him for stimulating conversation with each other, with the bookseller and with members of the audience. These bookstore visits/signings have been organized into podcasts easily accessed through iTunes. 

A sampling of some of his guests (authors I'm familiar with 😉): 

Harlan Coben, Christina Baker Kline, Greg Iles, Ann Patchett, author and owner of Parnassus Books in Nashville, TN Wiley Cash, Emma Straub, author and owner of Books Are Magic in Brooklyn, Amor Towles and Sue Grafton. 

The podcast with the late Sue Grafton in November 2017 is particularly interesting as is the talk between Grisham, Straub and Towles but I don't think you'd be disappointed in any of them. They alternate between being serious and poking fun at each other, a nice balance.