Continuing my recent run of legal thrillers, I finished The Runaway Jury by John Grisham yesterday.

Basically an excuse for listing all the reasons one should hate tobacco companies, The Runaway Jury is a legal thriller without action and with very little law of any interest. The plot is about a couple who find a way to manipulate the jury of a major tobacco case. They contact both the plaintiff and the defense to try to sell the verdict. Large sections of the book are reports of what the various witnesses had to say about the "evil" tobacco companies. The characters are as wooden and generic as can be and the twist ending, where the couple turn out to be very anti-tobacco and come up with a way to deliver the verdict for the plaintiff and make a small fortune for themselves at the same time, is both obvious and unbelievable. Even a legal laymen like myself could see the legal mistakes and oversights of the characters.

Overall, a very weak book.