If Grisham had elected to tell this story in a linear fashion, it would have been a good, if unremarkable, thriller. But spooled out in this deliberately disjointed fashion, it becomes a fascinating literary jigsaw puzzle, with pieces of the story from the book’s multiple sections finally clicking into place in the end. This is Grisham experimenting with the traditional legal-thriller format, and his experiment yields thoroughly engaging results ... The Grisham brand shows no signs of losing its power to draw readers, giving him the leverage to play with the thriller format, as he does successfully here.
Grisham’s forte of course is the legal thriller, not thick-cut literary Southern Gothic, but he has often drawn on the state’s racist framework for plot and character development ... This is an accurate portrait of Mississippi in the 1940s, and it illuminates one of the difficulties in writing about the era today.
I don’t think Grisham was trying to write a literary classic for the ages, but The Reckoning is deeper, more ambitious that his usual legal thrillers. The pacing is slower, deliberate, at times even sleepy. Stylistically, Grisham’s writing is matter-of-fact, the opposite of dazzling. But have no doubt: He knows how to spin a yarn ... A murder mystery, a courtroom drama, a family saga, a coming-of-age story, a war narrative, a period piece: The Reckoning is Grisham's argument that he's not just a boilerplate thriller writer. Most jurors will think the counselor has made his case.
Why would a respected war hero cold-bloodedly gun down the local pastor? That’s the central mystery in this subpar outing from bestseller Grisham ... Grisham fans will hope for a return to form next time.
As usual, Grisham does a solid job of portraying a Southern town at a particular moment in time, touching upon social issues as he goes. But the book never overcomes the hole at its center. It's one thing to create a character who is a mystery to those around him, quite another to reveal next to nothing about that character to the reader. After a while, Pete's one-note act becomes a bit of a drag. Grisham' entertaining wartime novel is not lacking in ambition or scope, but the spark of imagination that would grease its pages is largely missing.
