Stories involving mystery and romance are woven together in the book, including murder and a forbidden love affair between migrant workers. It expresses the desire to rise above life in the unpainted shack of a tenant farmer whose constant struggle to survive and bring in a crop provides the novel’s background. The family rents the eighty acres of cotton they farm, living what Grisham called a “harsh lifestyle.” The symbol of having a painted house becomes the recurring theme of the book. The book is narrated by farm boy Luke Chandler who lives with his parents and grandparents in a small, shabby, unpainted house. It was his twelfth novel, and almost every review included the phrase, “not your typical Grisham.” Known for his legal thrillers, most people expected a follow-up similar to his previous works, such as The Firm and The Pelican Brief, rather than a tale of struggling Arkansas farmers in 1952. After its serialization, the book was published in 2001. In 2000, John Grisham published a serialized version of A Painted House in the Oxford American magazine, of which he was publisher at the time. Nor are there judges, trials, courtrooms, conspiracies or nagging social issues.”

Set in 1952 Arkansas, it is a departure from his usual legal thriller style, with Grisham writing, “There is not a single lawyer, dead or alive, in this story. It was based on his childhood in Arkansas, and when the book was made into a television movie, it was filmed in Arkansas.īorn in Jonesboro (Craighead County) on February 8, 1955, and raised in northeast Arkansas near Black Oak (Craighead County), Grisham created an evocative portrait of the time and place of his childhood in A Painted House.

A Painted House is a book which takes place in Arkansas and was written by bestselling author John Grisham.

A painted house book review