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Bleachers
by: John Grisham

List Price: $12.00

Amazon.com's Price: $9.60

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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN: 9780385340878
ISBN: 0385340877
Label: Delta
Manufacturer: Delta
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 192
Publication Date: May 29, 2007
Publisher: Delta
Release Date: May 29, 2007
Sales Rank: 9342
Studio: Delta

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Editorial Review:

Product Description:

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.

Now, as Coach Rake’s “boys” sit in the bleachers waiting for the dimming field lights to signal his passing, they replay the old games, relive the old glories, and try to decide once and for all whether they love Eddie Rake – or hate him. For Neely Crenshaw, a man who must finally forgive his coach – and himself – before he can get on with his life, the stakes are especially high.

Amazon.com Review:
With Bleachers John Grisham departs again from the legal thriller to experiment with a character-driven tale of reunion, broken high school dreams, and missed chances. While the book falls short of the compelling storytelling that has made Grisham a bestselling author, it is nonetheless a diverting novella that succeeds as light fiction.

The story centers on the impending death of the Messina Spartans' football coach Eddie Rake. One of the most victorious coaches in high school football history, Rake is a man both loved and feared by his players and by a town that relishes his 13 state titles. The hero of the novel is Neely Crenshaw, a former Rake All-American whose NFL prospects ended abruptly after a cheap shot to the knees. Neely has returned home for the first time in years to join a nightly vigil for Rake at the Messina stadium. Having wandered through life with little focus since his college days, he struggles to reconcile his conflicted feelings towards his former coach, and he assays to rekindle love in the ex-girlfriend he abandoned long ago. For Messina and for Neely, the homecoming offers the prospect of building a life after Rake.

Physically a narrow book, Bleachers is a modest fiction in many respects. The emotional scope is akin to that of a short story, with a single-minded focus on explorations of nostalgia and regret. The dialogue, especially that of Neely's friend Paul Curry, is sometimes wooden as characters recall Messina history in paragraphs that were perhaps better left to the narrator. But Grisham has otherwise written a well-made, entertaining--if a bit sentimental--story. --Patrick O'Kelley

Customer Reviews

Average Rating: out of 5 stars

Rating:

- Good concept bad execution
Generall I love Grisham's work.
But this book seemed 'rushed' to get it out i guess is the only way to put it.
Way too much 'game' fillers, and you could tell the ending by the first 40 pages.
The revalation, was not that thrilling, expected but not the way it happened.

A football buff would enjoy this book than just the average reader, and they would only enjoy it because of the 'game' fillers.

Rating:

- Change of pace for Grisham (a review of the audiobook)
I, for one, am not especially enamored of Grisham's legal thrillers but I did enjoy Grisham's foray into non-legal fiction.

"Bleachers" was read by the author. Grisham's southern accent and good ol' boy style are sometimes helpful but his occassional odd emphasis and flat read can be distracting.

The book features a Bobby Knight/Woody Hayes type of small-town high school football coach - the winner of 13 Texas state championships. The coach is dying of cancer and his players are returning home to honor him and await his funeral. They meet several times on the bleachers of the field they played on, thus the title.

We see the reunion of players through the eys of Neeley, a former All-American QB who suffered a career-ending injury in college and never reached his full potential as a player. Although Neeley is our window to this workd, he is not the true focus of the book - it ... Read More

Rating:

- Bad reviewers are missing its merits.
There are a couple of strong messages that I felt made it worth reading, even if you aren't crazy about high school sports.

Number one: It was a relief to find out that in spite of the brevity of high school, we all tend to needlessly dwell on a few negative events that seemed so ridiculously important at the time.

Number two: Having tough coaches (or band directors or teachers, etc.) is great for your character. If I hadn't had a few barking drill sargeants in my youth, I'd probably be sitting on the front porch of my mobile home on an upholstered couch, drinking a beer, smoking a cigarette, and collecting welfare.

Give Grisham a break. This was an interesting risk in his career and I think it was worth it.

Rating:

- Small Town Football
If you like small towns you'll like this book - if you like small towns and football you'll love this book. It's a quick, engaging read. It's a departure from Grisham's legal drama. Great book!

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