The Street Lawyer: A Novel [Hardcover]

Michael was in a hurry. He was scrambling up the ladder at Drake & Sweeney, a giant D.C. law firm with eight hundred lawyers. The money was good and getting better; a partnership was three years away. He was a rising star with no time to waste, no time to stop, no time to toss a few coins into the cups of panhandlers. No time for a conscience.



But a violent encounter with a homeless man stopped him cold. Michael survived; his assailant did not. Who was this man? Michael did some digging, and learned that he was a mentally ill veteran who'd been in and out of shelters for many years. Then Michael dug a little deeper, and found a dirty secret, and the secret involved Drake & Sweeney.



The fast track derailed; the ladder collapsed. Michael bolted the firm and took a top-secret file with him. He landed in the streets, an advocate for the homeless, a street lawyer.



And a thief."Compelling...if there's any justice,The Street Lawyerwill be his biggest hit yet."—Entertainment Weekly

"An entertaining read with an important theme."—Chicago Sun-Times

"The plot surges forward, pulling us along as we turn those pages a mile a minute." –San Francisco Chronicle

A Main Selection of the Literary Guild and the Doubleday Book ClubJohn Grisham lives with his family in Virginia and Mississippi.  His previous novels areA Time to Kill, The Firm, The Pelican Brief, The Client, The Chamber, The Rainmaker, The Runaway Jury, andThe Partner.One

The man with the rubber boots stepped into the elevator behind me, but I didn't see him at first. I smelled him though--the pungent odor of smoke and cheap wine and life on the street without soap. We were alone as we moved upward, and when I finally glanced over I saw the boots, black and dirty and much too large. A frayed and tattered trench coat fell to his knees. Unl³J