John Grisham is a world renowned author and former attorney and politician. He was born in Jonesboro, Arkansas on February 8, 1955. His parents moved many times before settling in Southaven, Mississippi, where he went to high school. After graduating from Southaven High School, he went on to major in accounting at Mississippi State University and then law school at the University of Mississippi. He graduated from law school in 1981, the same year he married Renee Jones.
Grisham started a small law firm in Southaven, Mississippi, where he focused on criminal and civil law. In 1983 he was elected to the Mississippi House of Representatives. He decided to write his first book in 1984, after witnessing the testimony of a 12 year old rape victim. It took him three years in his spare time to complete his first book, “A Time to Kill,” which was finally published in 1988.
Immediately after finishing this first book, he began to write his second book, “The Firm,” even though his first book only had 5,000 copies printed. The movie rights to The Firm were sold for $600,000, even before the book was completed. This began his rise to worldwide stardom. He then gave up his law practice and began to write full-time. Writing one book a year, he would go on to write a total of twenty books, all of which have become international best sellers. Of his twenty novels, nine of them have been turned into movies. John Grisham lives with his wife and two children who all split time between their Mississippi farm and Virginia mansion. Grisham is active in several charitable causes, one of which is his Rebuild the Coast Fund to help rebuild the Mississippi Gulf Coast after Hurricane Katrina.
