Freebie Friday - Playing for Pizza by John Grisham

From GoodReads:

Rick Dockery was the third-string quarterback for the Cleveland Browns. In the AFC Championship game against Denver, to the surprise and dismay of virtually everyone, Rick actually got into the game. With a 17-point lead and just minutes to go, Rick provided what was arguably the worst single performance in the history of the NFL. Overnight, he became a national laughingstock and, of course, was immediately cut by the Browns and shunned by all other teams.

But all Rick knows is football, and he insists that his agent, Arnie, find a team that needs him. Against enormous odds Arnie finally locates just such a team and informs Rick that, miraculously, he can in fact now be a starting quarterback. Great, says Rick—for which team?

The mighty Panthers of Parma, Italy.

Yes, Italians do play American football, to one degree or another, and the Parma Panthers desperately want a former NFL player—any former NFL player—at their helm. So Rick reluctantly agrees to play for the Panthers—at least until a better offer comes along—and heads off to Italy. He knows nothing about Parma—not even where it is—has never been to Europe, and doesn’t speak or understand a word of Italian.

To say that Italy—the land of opera, fine wines, extremely small cars, romance, and Football Americano— holds a few surprises for Rick Dockery would be something of an understatement

Freebie Friday - The Client by John Grisham (2/3/12)

This is the story of eleven-year-old Mary Sway, who, as the novel opens, witnesses the bizarre suicide of a New Orleans attorney. Just before he dies, the lawyer tells Mark a deadly secret concerning the recent murder of a Louisiana Senator, whose accused killer, Mafia thug Barry Muldanna, is about to go to trail. The police, the federal prosecutor, and the FBI pressure Mark to tell them the attorney’s last words, but he knows that with the mob watching his every move, revealing his secret will almost surely get him killed. So Mark, streetwise and old beyond his years, hires a lawyer: Reggie Love, a fifty-two-year-old divorcee who’s been through more than anyone could imagine and survived, basically, because she’s tough. And fiesty. And loves helping kids overlooked or abused by the system. But when Mark’s life is threatened, and Reggie discovers her office has bee bugged, and even the Juvenile court judge says Mark has no choice but to talk, she realizes that this time she’s in way over her head. But then Mark comes up with a plan… a crazy plan, in Reggie’s opinion but it’s their only hope. And it just might work.


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Freebie Friday - A Time To Kill by John Grisham (Ends 4/22)

GoodReads Review:In this searing courtroom drama, best-selling author John Grisham probes the savage depths of racial violence... as he delivers a compelling tale of uncertain justice in a small southern town...

Clanton, Mississippi. The life of a ten-year-old girl is shattered by two drunken and remorseless young man. The mostly white town reacts with shock and horror at the inhuman crime. Until her black father acquires an assault rifle -- and takes justice into his own outraged hands.

For ten days, as burning crosses and the crack of sniper fire spread through the streets of Clanton, the nation sits spellbound as young defense attorney Jake Brigance struggles to save his client's life... and then his own...

Freebie Friday - A Painted House by John Grisham (ends 12/31)

Review from GoodReads
With A Painted House, however, he strikes out in a new direction. As the author is quick to note, this novel includes "not a single lawyer, dead or alive," and readers will search in vain for the kind of lowlife machinations that have been his stock-in-trade. Instead, Grisham has delivered a quieter, more contemplative story, set in rural Arkansas in 1952. It's harvest time on the Chandler farm, and the family has hired a crew of migrant Mexicans and "hill people" to pick 80 acres of cotton. A certain camaraderie pervades this bucolic dream team. But it's backbreaking work, particularly for the 7-year-old narrator, Luke: "I would pick cotton, tearing the fluffy bolls from the stalks at a steady pace, stuffing them into the heavy sack, afraid to look down the row and be reminded of how endless it was, afraid to slow down because someone would notice."

What's more, tensions begin to simmer between the Mexicans and the hill people, one of whom has a penchant for bare-knuckles brawling. This leads to a brutal murder, which young Luke has the bad luck to witness. At this point--with secrets, lies, and at least one knife fight in the offing--the plot begins to take on that familiar, Grisham-style momentum. Still, such matters ultimately take a back seat in A Painted House to the author's evocation of time and place. This is, after all, the scene of his boyhood, and Grisham waxes nostalgic without ever succumbing to deep-fried sentimentality. Meanwhile, his account of Luke's Baptist upbringing occasions some sly (and telling) humor:

I'd been taught in Sunday school from the day I could walk that lying would send you straight to hell. No detours. No second chances. Straight into the fiery pit, where Satan was waiting with the likes of Hitler and Judas Iscariot and General Grant. Thou shalt not bear false witness, which, of course, didn't sound exactly like a strict prohibition against lying, but that was the way the Baptists interpreted it.

Freebie Friday (ends 7/9/10)

Here is this week's Friday freebie





Playing for Pizza by John Grisham

Rick Dockery was the third-string quarterback for the Cleveland Browns. In the AFC Championship game against Denver, to the surprise and dismay of virtually everyone, Rick actually got into the game. With a 17-point lead and just minutes to go, Rick provided what was arguably the worst single performance in the history of the NFL. Overnight, he became a national laughingstock and, of course, was immediately cut by the Browns and shunned by all other teams.

But all Rick knows is football, and he insists that his agent, Arnie, find a team that needs him. Against enormous odds Arnie finally locates just such a team and informs Rick that, miraculously, he can in fact now be a starting quarterback. Great, says Rick—for which team?

The mighty Panthers of Parma, Italy.

Yes, Italians do play American football, to one degree or another, and the Parma Panthers desperately want a former NFL player—any former NFL player—at their helm. So Rick reluctantly agrees to play for the Panthers—at least until a better offer comes along—and heads off to Italy. He knows nothing about Parma—not even where it is—has never been to Europe, and doesn’t speak or understand a word of Italian.

To say that Italy—the land of opera, fine wines, extremely small cars, romance, and Football Americano— holds a few surprises for Rick Dockery would be something of an understatement.





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W...W....W.... Wednesday

WWW Wednesdays are hosted by MizB at Should Be Reading.


To play along, just answer the following three (3) questions…

* What are you currently reading?
* What did you recently finish reading?
* What do you think you’ll read next?


So here we go.....

* What are you currently reading?
Savor the Moment (#3 in the Quartet Series) by Nora Roberts

The Invisible Island (A-Z Mystery Series) by Ron Roy (audio) it's summer reading time for my nephews and I try to read along.


* What did you recently finish reading?

Playing for Pizza by John Grisham (audio) - was not what I expected, but was throughly enjoyed it.

The Haunted Hotel (A-Z Mystery Series) by Ron Roy (audio) it's summer reading time for my nephews and I try to read along.

The Essential Event Planning Kit by Godfrey Harris - recieved to review


* What do you think you’ll read next?

The Jaguar's Jewel (A-Z Mystery Series) by Ron Roy (audio)it's summer reading time for my nephews and I try to read along.

A book that I've gotten review, but not sure which one since I have 5 in the TBR pile