a pillar of the community who towered over local law and politics for forty years, judge atlee is now a shadow of his former self?a sick, lonely old man who has withdrawn to his sprawling ancestral home in clanton, mississippi. knowing that the end is near, judge atlee has issued a summons for his two sons to return to clanton to discuss his estate. ray atlee is the elder, a virginia law professor, newly single, still enduring the aftershocks of a surprise divorce. forrest is ray?s younger brother, the family?s black sheep.

, a young female Law Student named Darby Shaw writes a brief describing a theory she has on the murder of two Supreme Court Justices. It was a legal shot in the dark for Darby, a brilliant guess. To Washington, it was the one thorn that was sticking in their back.

Ford County, Mississippi, the setting of his first novel, A Time to Kill . This riveting collection of short stories features an unforgettable cast of characters: Wheelchair-bound Inez Graney and her two older sons embark on a bizarre road trip through the Mississippi Delta to visit Inez?s youngest son, Raymond?on death row. A hard-drinking, low-grossing divorce lawyer fed up with his wife, his life, and the law plans a drastic escape after an unexpected phone call. A quiet, unassuming data collector sets out to bring down a flashy casino owner with his skill at blackjack?as payback for the theft of his wife.

In 1970, Willie Traynor comes to Clanton, Mississippi, in a Triumph Spitfire and a fog of vague ambitions. Within a year, the twenty-three-year-old finds himself the owner of Ford County?s only newspaper, famous for its well-crafted obituaries. While the rest of America is in the grips of turmoil, Clanton lives on the edge of another age?until the brutal murder of a young mother rocks the town and thrusts Willie into the center of a storm.

? High school all-American Neely Crenshaw was probably the best quarterback ever to play for the legendary Messina Spartans. Fifteen years have gone by since those glory days, and Neely has come home to Messina to bury Coach Eddie Rake, the man who molded the Spartans into an unbeatable football dynasty.

Eleven-year-old Mark Sway and his younger brother are sharing a forbidden cigarette when a chance encounter with a suicidal lawyer leaves Mark knowing a bloody and explosive secret: the whereabouts of the most-sought-after dead body in America.

The novel is about an itinerant American football player who can no longer get work in the National Football League and whose agent, as a last resort, signs a deal for him to play for the Parma Panthers, in Parma, Italy.

In Chicago?s top law firm, a young lawyer stands on the brink of a brilliant career. Now twenty-six-year-old Adam Hall is risking it all for a death-row killer and an impossible case: Sam Cayhall is a former Klansman and unrepentant racist facing the death penalty for a fatal bombing in 1967. Cayhall has run out of chances?except for one: a determined lawyer who just happens to be his grandson.

Imagine a year without Christmas. No crowded malls, no corny office parties, no fruitcakes, no unwanted presents. That?s just what Luther and Nora Krank have in mind when they decide that, just this once, they?ll skip the holiday altogether. Theirs will be the only house on Hemlock Street without a rooftop Frosty, they won?t be hosting their annual Christmas Eve bash, they aren?t even going to have a tree. They won?t need one, because come December 25 they?re setting sail on a Caribbean cruise. But as this weary couple is about to discover, skipping Christmas brings enormous consequences?and isn?t half as easy as they?d imagined.