John Grisham Quotes

“I'm alone and outgunned, scared and inexperienced, but I'm right.”

— John Grisham

Shame was an emotion he had abandoned years earlier. Addicts know no shame. You disgrace yourself so many times you become immune to it.

— John Grisham

“Life is short..Live to the fullest..”

— John Grisham

“In one long glorious acknowledgment of failure, he laid himself bare before God.”

— John Grisham

“The coffee arrives, and we backslide into what lawyers do best
talking about other lawyers.”

— John Grisham

“He's my client, and he's counting on me. I'll take him, warts and all.”

— John Grisham

[you'll acquire] A certain amount of cynicism. This business works on you. When you were in law school you had some noble idea what a lawyer should be. A champion of individual rights; a defender of the Constitution; a guardian of the oppressed; an advocate for your client's principles. Then after you practice for six months you realize you were nothing but hired guns. Mouthpieces for sale to the highest bidder, available to anybody, any crook, any sleazebag with enough money to pay your outrageous fees. Nothing shocks you. It's supposed to be an honorable profession, but you'll meet so many crooked lawyers you'll want to quit and find an honest job. Yeah Mitch, you'll get cynical. And it's sad, really.

— John Grisham

“Anyone can cook a trout. The real art is in hooking the damned thing.”

— John Grisham

“You wired the kid," Truemann said meekly to no one in particular.
"Why not? No crime. You're the FBI, remember. You boys run more wire than AT&T."[Reggie Love]”

— John Grisham

“Once again I had asked an innocent question, and because of it, I was banished from the conversation.”

— John Grisham

Never trust a white person black people don't like.

— John Grisham

“The Senator did not know who owned the jet, nor had he ever met Mr. Trudeau, which in most cultures would seem odd since Rudd had taken so much money from the man. But in Washington, money arrives through a myriad of strange and nebulous conduits. Often those taking it have only a vague idea of where it's coming from; often they have no clue. In most democracies, the transference of so much cash would be considered outright corruption, but in Washington the corruption has been legalized. Senator Rudd didn't know and didn't care that he was owned by other people.”

— John Grisham

“Make friends with fear, Lucien always said, because it will not go away, and it will destroy you if left uncontrolled.”

— John Grisham

Life on the run was filled with dreams, some at night during sleep, real dreams, and some when the mind was awake but drifting. Most were terrifying, the nightmares of the shadows growing bolder and larger. Others were pleasant wishes of a rosy future, free of the past. These were rare, Patrick had learned. Life on the run was life in the past. There was no closure

— John Grisham

“He counts votes before he decides what to have for breakfast.”

— John Grisham

“A sharp bolt of hunger hit Luther hard. His knees almost buckled, his poker face almost grimaced. For two weeks now his sense of smell had been much keener, no doubt a side effect of a strict diet. Maybe he got a whiff of Mabel's finest, he wasn't sure, but a craving came over him. Suddenly, he had to have something to eat. Suddenly, he wanted to snatch the bag from Kendall, rip open a package, and start gnawing on a fruitcake.”

— John Grisham

What kind of name is Siler-Spence? I mean, what's wrong with these women who use hyphens? What if her name was Skowinski and she married a guy named Levondowski? Would her little liberated soul insist she go through life as F.Gwendolin Skowinski- Levondowski?

— John Grisham

“And I'm sure Theo can always find her.”

— John Grisham

“We were invincible because we were eighteen and stupid.”

— John Grisham

“I was hurting, too. How could she have done such a terrible thing? She was my friend. She treated me like a confidant, and she protected me like a big sister. I loved Tally, and now she had run off with a vicious killer.”

— John Grisham

I've loved you all my life. Even before we met. Part of it wasn't even you. It was just a promise of you.

— John Grisham

“Hubbard obtained the land from Sylvester's widow.”

— John Grisham

“Fawcett, who had no valid reason to recuse”

— John Grisham

“He lived forty-four years and no one cried at his funeral.”

— John Grisham

“Since he does not yet have the name of the killer,”

— John Grisham

“The reason is obvious. You're my grandfather, okay. Like it or not, you're who you are and i'm who i am. And i'm here right now, so what are we going to do about it? -Adam Cayhall-”

— John Grisham

“The human body was not meant for such abuse. After about six months they lost steam.”

— John Grisham

“Litigation funders are private companies that raise money from their investors to buy into big lawsuits.”

— John Grisham

I learned a long time ago not to waste time analyzing why judges do the things they do.

— John Grisham

“Some of his transactions involved Ada policemen, specifically one Dennis Corvin, whom Gore described as a primary supplier”

— John Grisham

“Like so many, this trial is not about the truth; it's about winning.”

— John Grisham

“Some of our clients have not been saints, but no lawyer can dictate morals to his client.”

— John Grisham

“Perhaps in another era, a trial was an exercise in the presentation of facts, the search for truth, and the finding of justice. Now a trial is a contest in which one side will win and the other side will lose. Each side expects the other to bend the rules or to cheat, so neither side plays fair. The truth is lost in the melee.”

— John Grisham

“Not. Pound him because he cannot respond from jail, and why would he bother anyway? Do it Monday and make sure Dumas Lee and every other reporter with even”

— John Grisham

“Mr. Baldwin, to get away from”

— John Grisham

“Family, and by the time they took their seats”

— John Grisham

“As a lawyer, she never felt so worthy. As a person, she had never felt so needed.”

— John Grisham

“Miranda v. Arizona, the most famous of all self-incrimination cases, the Supreme Court imposed procedural safeguards to protect the rights of the accused. A suspect has a constitutional right not to be compelled to talk, and any statement made during an interrogation cannot be used in court unless the police and the prosecutor can prove that the suspect clearly understood that (1) he had the right to remain silent, (2) anything said could be used against him in court, and (3) he had a right to an attorney, whether or not he could afford one. If, during an interrogation, the accused requests an attorney, then the questioning stops immediately.”

— John Grisham

“Looked as if she might”

— John Grisham

Fifty feet away, five volunteers waited behind a curtain with high-powered rifles, though only four were loaded. The theory was that none of the five would ever know for sure that he killed a man, and this was somehow suppose to assuage his guilt later in life, in the event that he had a change of heart and became burdened. What a crock! There was a long list of volunteers, all eager to put a bullet dead center in another's man's heart.

— John Grisham

“Why bother with a trial? If the cops can't convict with evidence, they use the media to convict with suspicion.”

— John Grisham

At times he thinks like a terrorist, then he cries like a little child.
- Reggie Love

— John Grisham

“No, thanks. They won't go away. You take care of Ricky and Mom, and me and the lawyer'll take care of the FBI.”

— John Grisham

“Nobody wants to read about the honest lawyer down the street who does real estate loans and wills. If you want to sell books, you have to write about the interesting lawyers - the guys who steal all the money and take off. That's the fun stuff.”

— John Grisham

“More than 100 people have been sent to death row who were later exonerated because they weren't guilty or fairly tried. Most criminal defendants do not get adequate representation because there are not enough public defenders to represent them. There is a lot that is wrong.”

— John Grisham

“Every morning I wake at 6am or 6.30am, champing at the bit.”

— John Grisham

“I'm not itching to sue Amazon or Wal-Mart ... they sell a lot of books. But the future is very uncertain with books.”

— John Grisham

“It's hard to read good fiction when I am writing, because if it is really good I catch myself sort of inadvertently imitating a great writer.”

— John Grisham

You live your life today, Not tommorow, and certainly not yesterday.

— John Grisham

“I've sold too many books to get good reviews anymore. There's a lot of jealousy, because [reviewers] think they can write a good novel or a best-seller and get frustrated when they can't. I've learned to despise them.”

— John Grisham