I admit that I hate John Grisham novels. I just cannot stand the prose. I used to like Scott Turrow well enough, especially his nonfiction 1L novel which came out when I was a 3L. Scott was a year behind me in law school so his 1L year was during my 2L year. Then he was a federal prosecutor when I was a prosecutor in the Cook County State's Attorney's office. We shared one defendant in common and had to discuss on the phone which of us was going to prosecute him first. I think it may have been me.

Now comes a legal novel from a bright young up-and-coming law professor at Penn: Kermit Roosevelt. I met Kim last year at the NYU Constitutional Law Colloquium and was impressed. I would have been even more impressed had I known that a novel was forthcoming. The novel is In the Shadow of the Law. I have only just seen the ad for it, but it sounds like great summer reading.

From Booklist: If the first few pages of Roosevelt's debut call to mind John Grisham, don't be fooled. This isn't a plot-driven legal thriller of the sort Grisham writes. The protagonist is Law, with a capital L, and Roosevelt, who has both taught and practiced law, creates his story with full attention to his subject's multidimensional personality. Law is greedy, amoral, ruthless, and all-consuming; yet, in its own way, it is elegant, even beautiful, and fair, when practiced by lawyers with conscience. Law thoroughly overshadows the human characters: Wayne Harper, awaiting execution on Virginia's death row; the victims of an explosion in a Texas chemical factory; even a group of legal associates learning the ropes at Morgan Siler, a top D.C. law firm. "If you give yourself to the [law], it will give you something in return," one of the partners tells a puzzled associate. He's right, but the gift isn't always what's expected. Legal terms and concepts abound so this isn't breezy reading; thought-provoking is a much more accurate description. Stephanie Zvirin

Update: I decided to enable comments so other can recommend their favorite "Legal Novels."