The Rainmaker

A Novel

By: John Grisham

Narrated by: Frank Muller

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “A taut and terrific page-turner” (Entertainment Weekly) from the master of the courtroom thriller

In development as a USA Network series starring John Slattery

It’s summer in Memphis. The sweat is sticking to Rudy Baylor’s shirt and creditors are nipping at his heels. Once he had aspirations of breezing through law school and punching his ticket to the good life. Now he doesn’t have a job or a prayer—except for one: an insurance dispute that leaves a family devastated and opens the door for a lawsuit, if Rudy can find a way to file it.

By the time Rudy gets to court, a heavyweight corporate defense team is there to meet him. And suddenly he’s in over his head, plunged into a nightmare of lies and legal maneuverings. A case that started small is exploding into a thunderous million-dollar war of nerves, skill, and outright violence—a fight that could cost one young lawyer his life, or turn him into the biggest rainmaker in the land.

©1995 John Grisham (P)1995 Bantam Doubleday Dell Audio Publishing, Bantam Doubleday Dell Audio Publishing, A Division of Random House Inc.

Critic reviews

“A mighty narrative talent and an unerring eye for hot-button issues . . . Grisham also reveals for the first time a surprising knack for comedy.”—Chicago Sun-Times

“Great fun to read . . . The complex plotting is Grisham’s major accomplishment.”—Los Angeles Times

“Passages in The Rainmaker are reminiscent of Pat Conroy. . . . This is Grisham’s most barbed book since The Firm, and it is by far his most entertaining.”—People

“Melding the courtroom savvy of A Time to Kill with the psychological nuance of The Chamber, imbued with wry humor and rich characters, this bittersweet tale, the author’s quietest and most thoughtful, shows that Grisham’s imagination can hold its own in a courtroom as well as on the violent streets outside.”—Publishers Weekly

One of Grisham's Best

This is a great story that takes us from a law student's last year in school through a gripping trial. The twists and turns keep us guessing. You are not going to predict what is coming next easily. I cannot say enough about this work.

The characters are believable really easy to like (and dislike.) The writing keeps the listener interested all the way through. This one makes the miles go by fast.

At this point there needs to be a note on the technical side of creating this audio book. The process to convert this title to Audible format is very sloppy.

It is reasonably certain Audible took this audio book from commercially produced CD's available in book stores. This book treats the listener to the fade out and fade in between disk changes. At one point we hear an announcer tell us "This is disk 8."

The production glitches are not distracting enough to take all that much from the story, but they are distracting. Technical issues really affect some listeners so it needs to be mentioned here.

It also wouldn't hurt Audible to get some feedback on the their production standards.

the best so far

i have only read a few of his books and this by far is the best. I love books that take you where you are not expecting. Narrator is great too. I definetly didnt want this book to end.

All-time Fav

One of my favorites. I must have listened to this book 20 times.

Terrific listen

A good story by the BEST narrator.

Have you listened to any of Frank Muller’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

I've listened to almost all of Frank Muller's other performances. I specifically looked up some old books that he did just for the joy of hearing his voice again. He was one of the greats and his story makes me sad. Enjoy a great book read by the GREAT Frank Muller.

One of Grisham's Best

Would you consider the audio edition of The Rainmaker to be better than the print version?

Quite focused without a lot of side stories. More focused than some of his later books.I found myself laughing out loud quite a number of times during the reading. Just finished two other Grisham books this weeks and there was no humor at all. Makes me wonder if the same person wrote all these books. Lots of interesting information and the ending was unpredictable which is always fun. Problem I found in 2 recorded audio books this week was poor editing because of repetition of the same line at least 6 times.

Who was your favorite character and why?

Rudy was my favorite because he is the head of the pack. The story is definitely about him and his beginnings as a lawyer.

What three words best describe Frank Muller’s performance?

Very excellent narration. Voices of characters were believable and different with a very large range of accents and tonalities. Very different from the narration of the Whistleblower which I read earlier this week and which narration was not enjoyable and it distracted me from the story.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

No. I couldn't do it all in one sitting but I had a bad flu this week and this was the perfect answer to keep me in bed and getting better by plenty of hot tea and bedrest. Very absorbing and I read 3 of his novels this week in bed, got very much better. A pleasant way to get bed rest and get over the flu.

Any additional comments?

I was hapy to read some reviews before I bought. I think these are very helpful and I do always read them before buying.

John Grisham "The Rainmaker"

If you could sum up The Rainmaker in three words, what would they be?

Super Super Super

Who was your favorite character and why?

Don't have a favorite character

Have you listened to any of Frank Muller’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

This was the first one I have listened to by Frank Muller. I like it.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

I like the book.

Any additional comments?

None

Riveting

My husband & I listened to The Rainmaker on our last trip. Loved it, had to finish listening once we arrived home.

Don't let crappy sound in preview scare you!

I didn't purchase this book for quite some time because the preview sounded like cassette quality, rest assured, the book is a good sound quality and a great book to boot! Well worth the credit!

outstanding story

I loved the court room antics, especially the judge. Hated for the book to end.

Cruel cruel world

There was a lot of information conveyed by this book, and it was really an interesting story, except for the romantic aside, which was unnecessary. If someone had taken time to clear the disk breaks out of the Audible production I think I could have given almost 5 stars. The repeated sentences can be defensible when the book is on compact disks or tape, being a way to let listeners know that they've inserted the correct follow-on disk or tape, but when you purchase an Audible book on purpose to avoid having to play around with all that ancient technology I think most of us must be annoyed by the incongruous interruptions. There is no category for rating technical issues when assigning stars, so I decided to rate the performance, even though the narrator was actually excellent and I would have given him 5 stars. So shame on Audible. Clean up your act.