The Broker | John Grisham | Grisham back on great form

The Broker | John Grisham | low-key suspense

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The Broker

	The Broker John Grisham Delta, 2006 - 384 pages average customer review:based on 570 reviews view larger image
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In his final hours in the Oval Office, the outgoing President grants a controversial last-minute pardon to Joel Backman, a notorious Washington power broker who has spent the last six years hidden away in a federal prison. What no one knows is that the President issues the pardon only after receiving enormous pressure from the CIA. It seems Backman, in his power broker heyday, may have obtained secrets that compromise the world?s most sophisticated satellite surveillance system.

Backman is quietly smuggled out of the country in a military cargo plane, given a new name, a new identity, and a new home in Italy. Eventually, after he has settled into his new life, the CIA will leak his whereabouts to the Israelis, the Russians, the Chinese, and the Saudis. Then the CIA will do what it does best: sit back and watch. The question is not whether Backman will survive?there is no chance of that. The question the CIA needs answered is, who will kill him?

From the Hardcover edition.

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Grisham back on great form

Not everything John Grisham writes is a winner. Remember 'The Brethren' about some highly unlikely judges in jail? And 'The Testament' was also a clunker. But basically Grisham is a safe bet, with a good tale, well told and the usual young and struggling Mississippi lawyer hero who appears under different names but always gets justice in the end. Well, forget all that. Here, our hero lives in Italy and he's not really a hero at all. But he's a hell of a lot nicer than the guys who are after him.

The Broker is a lot of fun. It's a just a great read - pick it up and whizz through it. It's not great literature, but it is Grisham doing what he does best - producing an intriguing plot, credible characters and a setting spiced with real detail that comes from knowing the location well. I liked it and I think you will.

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low-key suspense

Joel Backman is "the Broker"--a Washington power broker-lobbyist. Then his empire collapses when a deal collapses involving a hacked spy satellite that nobody acknowledges, and Backman ends up in jail, broke.

Six years later, he's pardoned by a lame duck President, and whisked away to Italy by the CIA. Everyone's after him, including the CIA, though they're more interesting in finding out who kills him than in either killing him themselves or keeping him safe.

So Backman is completely out of his element, under constant surveillance, and kept deliberately short of money and paperwork so he can't run far, even if he tries. But he didn't get to be "the Broker" by being stupid, either.

This was a fairly low-key suspense book, but I enjoyed the transformation from wealthy cold-hearted power broker to someone who's dependent on others for everything, and who's learning to reevaluate his priorities. It was also quite lovely to revisit Italy.

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Fine as far as it goes

I'm not an avid reader of Grisham's - I might have read a couple of his early books in high school - so I can't really measure this against previous work. As a suspense/thriller type book, it's fine as far as it goes. The plot isn't terribly complicated and it is difficult to get very involved...at the end of the book, I was left with a feeling of, well, not much. Still, it is a fun read and has inspired me to visit Bologna!

reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10

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