It's a weekend during the Fall of 1988 in Clanton, Mississippi, and young lawyer Jake Brigance, living with wife and daughter in a rented house, is wondering where the next client is coming from, and losing sleep over the possibility local Klan members will torch this house as they did the one he used to own.
Opening his mail at the office on the following Monday, there's a letter from Seth Hubbard, a local businessman but unknown to Jake, enclosing a handwritten will. He wants Jake to act for him to ensure the beneficiary gets her inheritance. He couldn't deliver the will in person as he's just killed himself.
This sets then ball rolling in an intriguing but over-populated tale (a plethora of characters) of Jake acting for a poor black client while richer white ones engage smart talent from near-by Memphis to fight the contents of the will.
For Hubbard's beneficiary is his $5-an-hour cleaning lady and he must have been off his rocker or coerced to sign over $21 million to her rather than his somewhat repulsive children.
Although the good guys/bad guys are stereotypes, the convincing plot with its twists and turns and an especially a stunning climax, will make the plod-plod bits well worth the effort.
Ian Williams is a Dunedin writer and composer.
