Hi Friends,
The Summons is a story of a Judge Reuben Atlee and his two sons Ray Atlee and Forrest Atlee.
Ray Atlee is a law professor and Forrest is a drug addict who stays clean in between for a period of 7 or 8 months before again going to booze and drugs.
Judge Atlee is old and he summons both his sons back to him home. Ray arrives first and finds Judge dead in his sofa. Ray also finds the will of Judge according to which Ray is the executor of the estate and Ray and Forrest will share everything equally.
Then while going through the belongings of Judge Atlee Ray suddenly finds $ 3 million in cash in study of the old villa of Judge named Mapple Run. Ray is shocked by his findings and he is caught in a situation where he is not able to decide weather to include the cash in the estate or not.
Ray thought that if he included the money in the estate then Forrest will get a very big amount of money and then he will again resort to drugs and with this big an amount he just might kill himself.
So Ray though the better of it and decided to keep the money to him. He concealed the money.
He takes the money back to his flat but he starts getting anonymous threats about the money. He decides to find out the origin of money, from where it came, weather the money is good or bad and things like that.
With threats and attempts on his life and constant raiding of his flat during his absence Ray is in deep tension. He is fed up with this intimidation and finally decides to follow the instructions being given to him while intimidation and goes back to the Mapple Run and fills the money in the same cardboard boxes where he found the money.
He did everything as he was directed to do. Finally he was directed to get out of the house and he did so and ran away only to learn later that all money was gone and Mapple Run was burned.
Because Mapple Run ? the villa was the only asset on the estate of Judge Atlee, there is no money left on the estate now after the villa is burned. Ray is however, financially well off, but still the question of origin on money haunts him.
So he checks the cases of Judge Atlee and the trials in which he was juror. He found one trial file missing. Ray starts to get hints of the source of money. Now as Ray investigates a new character enters into the frame named Patton French. He is mass tort lawyer in Biloxi, a very successful one, and he is the one who paid these $3 million to Judge Atlee in his older years because Patton French knew that Judge was fighting from cancer and he wanted to help him to live his last years in good way at least. Pretty decent, huh?!
However, still he is not sure who was after the money. Leaving this question in his mind, Ray goes to meet his brother in a joint where he is undergoing treatment. People over there report to Ray that Forrest is missing, he perhaps ran from the joint, drug addicts often do.
Ray discovers Forrest finally in a very expensive treatment house, situated far away from the city and with army discipline. That place cost over $1 million a year. Ray is surprised how Forrest is able to afford such an expensive place. Suddenly something crosses Ray?s mind can Forrest be the person who was after the money.
In a final dialogue between Ray and Forrest in the joint, Forrest conceals everything to Ray and tells him he was after the money and he knew about the existence of money even before Ray came and found out the Judge dead on his sofa. Forrest even accepted that he bought extra morphine to Judge because he was suffering with so much pain that it was better to end his life and he was not going to live a long life either.
Bewildered by everything, Ray moves to his flat and his life in the law school and Forrest goes back to the joint for his treatment and he hopes that this time finally he will be able to get off drugs in the expensive rehab centre.
Well, a nice story. But it has got its faults also. One thing, the ending of story is very quick. The ending seems quick because the previous story is uselessly stretched. By the time reader reaches its end he almost looses interest and is reading just to finish the novel quickly because there are some elements that will make you itch. Primarily the mystery man behind the money and the source.
Otherwise, the novel is a very boring work by John because it moves pathetically slow and it has nothing interesting or new to read. It is okay to read if you are in a journey and there is no other book available but otherwise to read it even on a weekend, I feel, is a waste of time.
Also after reading the above story you need not read anything because I have given you everything that happens in the story and there is nothing left to know.
Please save your time for some other good book because this is a very boring and depressing work by John Grisham. We all know that he can do much better than this, but he constantly keeps on coming out with bad novels like The King of torts and The Summons.
Hope John Grisham gives something good next time. This one is time waste!
Mr. Gautam