The Confession, by John Grisham

In The Confession, Grisham has brought together his straight-forward, page-turning suspenseful style, a la The Firm with the anti-death penalty, justice system reforming crusade of The Innocent Man.  The stalwart pro-death penalty advocate may not enjoy this book, but if you have any sympathy at all for the Innocence Project, which works to "free the staggering numbers of innocent people who remain incarcerated and to bring substantive reform to the system responsible for their unjust imprisonment," and for people who are wrongly convicted of crimes, you will appreciate the tone and message of The Confession.

The Confession is the page-turner Grisham fans have come to expect from him.  The story alone doesn't rank as one of Grisham's best, but that's like saying one of Beethoven's symphonies isn't one of his best.  The Confession is still a great story.  The premise is rather simple: Travis Boyette, a convicted rapist and all around nasty guy, reads that a Donte Drumm is about to be executed for the murder of a cheerleader from Drumm's school.  Boyette remembers her well: he stalked her, kidnapped her, raped her, and murdered her, and got away with it.  His convictions were for other crimes.  Boyette tells his story to an earnest minister, who make it his mission to stop Drumm's execution.

As is Grisham's style, the plot is straightforward, seemingly predictable, but with just enough surprises to keep the reader interested.  The case against Drumm seems ludicrously flimsy, but I'm sure Grisham was inspired by actual cases, in which an outside observer would be dumbstruck to learn that someone was convicted on such flimsy evidence.  With the omniscient author's perspective, Grisham builds a firm case for the wrongfulness of Drumm's conviction.  On those grounds, The Confession becomes an entertaining, highly readable, anti-death-penalty argument.

Maybe I'm just more aware, having read this book, but it seems like there are more and more examples of people wrongfully convicted of crimes.  One day when I was almost finished with the book, the Star-Telegram ran a front-page article about a man who has already been executed, but whose guilt has been called into question because a hair found at the scene of the crime--the sole piece of physical evidence tying him to the crime--turned out not to be his.  On the same day, one of the S-T editors wrote an editorial stating that Texas could actually save money by abolishing the death penalty, because the expense of the automatic appeals process far exceeds the expense of housing a prisoner for life.  Arguments for the deterrent quality of the death penalty fade in the face of evidence that it is, even in only in a small minority of cases, wrongfully implemented.  From the perspective of justice, as well as economics, there's a strong argument that it simply doesn't make sense to have a death penalty.

Even with the strong-handed argument overshadowing the story, The Confession delivers.  Grisham fans will enjoy it; non fans will probably enjoy it, too.  For a "message" novel, it's definitely worth a read.