Camino Island

Camino Island – by John Grisham

Whenever I read a story (real or fictitious) about a famous piece of art being stolen, I can’t help but ask myself: How does one achieve ransom for such a heist? If the piece of art is THAT well known, wouldn’t everyone be looking for it? Wouldn’t the thief be very easy to trace?  To me it seems about as pointless as making off with a suitcase full of cash when you knew ahead of time that all of the bills were marked.

Anyway, this book is a bit of a departure for John Grisham as it doesn’t fall into the category of a ‘legal’ thriller. Grisham has strayed away from the topic that made him famous with mixed results.  Some, such as “A Painted House” were great. Others, such as “Skipping Christmas” bring a new meaning to the term “awful”. Still, Grisham is a great writer, so I’m of the opinion that he can write about whatever he chooses. Unfortunately, that’s not to say that he’s always successful.  Camino Island is a book that seems to have several half-baked ideas yet never seems to really get to its final destination with any sort of excitement or flair.  This book, overall, was not a very good story.  It’s a good thing John Grisham wrote it, though, as he can take a mediocre story and at least keep the reader turning the pages.

A well-planned heist succeeds and a group of five criminals manage to lift all of the original manuscripts of the novels by F. Scott Fitzgerald. At the conclusion of the heist at the end of the first chapter, Grisham roughly slams on the breaks and takes his story in a different direction. Instead of reading much more about the criminals, the story instead focuses on the potential whereabouts for the ill-gotten booty; a bookstore on a place called Camino Island.

Investigators find a young, struggling author (Mercer Mann) who has just lost a job at a university where she was employed as an adjunct professor. It seems as though she has a personal history with Camino Island, so she’s recruited to go live there by the investigators, work on an unfinished novel, assimilate herself into the community, and spy on the bookstore and the bookstore’s owner.

There’s a lot of potential here, and this novel could go in many different directions, but it sadly never does.  There’s nothing really here that we read that is particularly interesting nor surprising. In fact, once she arrives on the island, things seem to be a bit unrealistic.  Do bookstores on remote islands in the middle of nowhere really command the notoriety that we read about here?  Are there really THAT many published authors that all happen to live in such close proximity to each other?  Remember, we’re talking about a remote island here, not Midtown Manhattan.

It’s been noted by other readers that John Grisham is probably doing a bit of disservice to his reputation by cranking out at least one book every year.  Maybe he has a deal with his publisher to do just that. Of course, if I was the publisher and I had a hot commodity like John Grisham, I’d probably want him to churn out books at an unrealistic level as well.  This book just seemed rushed and unfocused. Had Grisham had another year or two to work on this thing, I believe it could have been much better as it definitely had potential.  The direction it ended up going in, however, seemed too safe, too easy, and it felt like the author was just checking off a box.  It’s somewhat ironic that the main protagonist in this story is also an author who ‘can’t seem to come up with any ideas for the book she’s working on’.

Although I was disappointed in the story, I would still recommend the book for light reading.  Had any other author been tasked to write this same story, it would have ended up quite awful.  Finishing this book was like eating a meal at a restaurant that you didn’t find particularly tasty.  The food was merely adequate, and you felt full after eating, but you probably won’t be going back to the restaurant any time soon.

I firmly believe that if Grisham would cut down on his output, he might only write about half as many books, but they would probably be twice as enjoyable as a lot of his latter-day work.