It’s a story of redemption, much more so than I remembered from the first time I read it. You can feel the heat, sense the dread when the rains come, and see the natives and how they live. Grisham has been on location in the Pantanal. With so many players involved, and even more attorneys, the plot moves along quickly. The author takes you back and forth, between the family with their demands to hear the will, the attorney firm, and Nate on his dangerous search to find Rachel. So begins a difficult search by a troubled man. To find her, the attorney firms chooses one of their high powered attorneys who is currently in rehab–again–for alcoholism. Turns out this daughter, Rachel Lane, is a missionary whose last known address was in South America, working with an Indian tribe way off the beaten path. That will leaves pretty much everything (We’re talking the eleven billion dollar range) to his illegitimate daughter who no one knew existed.

What they didn’t see, was the subsequent handwritten will given the attorneys after they left the room. His unlikable family, now expecting to be wealthy, start spending. I loved it!Ī billionaire announces his last will and testament to his money hungry family, dismisses them, then leaps from a window. Less time in the court room, and plenty of adventure in the Pantanal area of the Brazilian wetlands. This story has an unusual twist to it though. He’s so well know for his legal thrillers, like The Firm, The Client, or A Time to Kill. The Testament is one of my favorite books by John Grisham.

The Testament by John Grisham