Sycamore Row: John Grisham in his element

A old, reclusive man, dying of cancer, hangs himself from a sycamore tree in his estate, leaving behind nearly all his hard-earned millions to his black housekeeper. His estranged children, who have been cut out of Seth Hubbard's "substantial" fortune in the last-minute handwritten will, are having none of it – the battelines are drawn for a long legal tussle.     

John Grisham returns to his beloved Ford County, Mississippi, for a sequel to his 1989 debut novel. Three years after the events of A Time to Kill, when young attorney Jake Brigance gets his big win in a racially charged trial in the town of Clanton, his services  are called on again to defend Seth's will. “I want this will defended at all costs,” Seth says in a letter to Jake, peppered with choice words at lawyers. “Fight them, Mr. Brigance, to the bitter end.” 

It's a good ol' fashioned courtroom brawl, and Grisham is in his element, painting it in all its colour and plentiful shades of grey. It's supposed to be dull – there are enough warnings of “death by deposition”, and the legal process, as always, is described in detail. But in a Grisham book, that only brings a comforting familiarity that draws out the chuckles, a sign to put on your softest pyjamas and get some hot chocolate for when stuff hits the fan.              

What made Seth do what he did? Sycamore Row's great reveal is tense and competent, but comes as less of a surprise than other plot twists we've known the author to pull off. Compared to its predecessor, this one seems to tread more cautiously around political correctness. And Lettie Lang, the black housekeeper, is no Carl Lee Hailey.   

Repeated jokes and some inexplicable minor talking points in a 550-page novel are other gripes, but there was, nonetheless, a satisfaction in meeting old characters and stars of other Grisham novels set in the area: Harry Rex, overweight divorce lawyer and loyal friend; Lucien Wilbanks, drunken landlord and mentor; Willie Traynor, one-time journalist and millionaire; the no-nonsense Judge Atlee who we know has some secrets of his own...There's definitely enough character in Ford County for a few more Acts.

This Happily-Ever-After thing never really ends

Two things that'll survive as Things Fall Apart - chocolate and happy endings.

According to a BBC report, Hollywood has traditionally been quick to employ artistic liberty and liberally sprinkle its annual produce with happy endings during times of gloom.

The BBC's calls this 'happyendification' and makes a perfectly pleasant fairy-tale ingredient sound like an embarrassing body condition.

Let me take a moment here to say I Knew It All Along.

It's time the contribution of escapism and the comforting predictability of stories to the collective human sanity is well recognised.

Hell yea we've earned it after living in reality the rest of the day.

Of course one (means I) shall be willing to appreciate (albeit slightly grudgingly) the (apparent) emotional depth and narrative intricacies of a tear-jerker and one (me again, with a Queenly disposition) will clap when it gets that Oscar.

But with the power to decide an ending for any fictitious expression, why not choose to brighten some dreamer's day. Leave the depressing stuff for Robert Peston, willya.

Princess Lessons

It ought to be my dirty little secret, but I owe these books too much to hide the truth.

I love the Princess Diaries. All ten of them.

I'm quite certainly too old to be in the demographic that the books target, but I remain a sucker for happy endings and I credit them immensely for their significant contribution towards my social and emotional development.

Why deny it - I've learnt more about myself, my friends, and everything that goes with being part of the cell phone, iPod, pop-culture, consumerist generation, from TPD.

Other books have real conflict. The heroes and the heroines have real problems - war, poverty, no family, evil witches.

It's all very well that that's inspiring, but that doesn't really help me in my cushioned existence now, does it?

Just because I have nothing but love, friendship and comfort at every step, doesn't mean I'm going to give up on having some drama in my life.

Me and Mia, we like the drama.

It's my right to have problems. Loads of them. Nobody has problems bigger than mine and I'm convinced that my world will end.

So it's an extremely grounding experience to be reminded in rather amusing literary style (full of smart contemporary pop-cultural references that have for too long been denied the recognition deserved in fiction) that none of my problems are problems at all.

That every nobody-understand-me or nobody-cares-about-me situation is a been-there-done-that-so-get-over-it for every other formerly self-pitying teenager (and 20-something to be fair).

That happily-ever-after is only what I make of it. And hence, there's still hope for happily-ever-after. After-all, everyone needs the fuzzy feeling of a happy ending :)

Just.

"For you, a thousand times over!"
-The Kite Runner

That'd be a truly exciting refrain for a life song.

Mostly...

It's consoling. That even if the world ends today, somewhere is The King in a pink spaceship to represent the human race.
We should however at this juncture hope that nobody else Randomly picks up Dent's (shall we say) ticket to travel first class.