John Grisham - The Summons

This story concerns a man summoned home by his ailing father. He finds his father dead and he also finds a large amount of hidden money. The plot revolves around his attempt to determine where the money comes from and his struggle to decide what he should do with it.

The main character, Ray Atlee is a law professor with a good salary at the University of Virginia. He has a brother, Forrest, and a dying father, known to many as Judge Reuben V. Atlee. Ray is sent to his father's estate in Clanton, Mississippi, to discuss issues regarding the old man's will and estate. To do this, Ray had to go to Ford County, the setting for many of John Grisham's other books such as A Time To Kill. In this book, we get introduced to characters from the other books such as Harry Rex Vonner. When he finds his father dead in the study Ray discovers a sum of over three million dollars in the house, money which was not part of Judge Atlee's will. Ray immediately thought the money was "dirty" because his father couldn't possibly make so much money in his career.

Assuming that he was the only one who knew about the money, Ray decided he would take it without making it officially part of the estate, and did not tell anyone about it. He knew that if he made it a part of the estate, taxes will take most of the money. But later reality proves otherwise. Ray was being followed -- someone else knew about the money. After his own investigations into the roots of the money and the identity of his shadow -- investigations which include trips to casinos and shady meetings with prominent southern lawyers -- he discovers the truth about the money and his stalker.

Anyone interested in reading the novel can mail me at smartworks2009@gmail.com