Set in 1952 Arkansas A Painted House is the story of a harvest time on a poor cotton farm through the eyes of a seven year old boy.

Whilst this may sound boring, the two dead bodies, peeping tom activities, illegitimate babies and nature's proclivity to fight man's will gives plenty of material to keep you drawn in and turning the pages.

That's without considering the picturesque painting of 1950s farming life that flows from the pages, a time when there wasn't a tv and phone in the farmhouse, a time when a bad harvest meant you only ate what you could grow.

Very entertaining and interesting book.

Oh, and a house gets some paint on it.

Oh my gosh. How many secrets can a 7 or 8 year old hard working boy be expected to keep????

This story was rather dull and just kept going on and on and on and on and I could see no purpose. I've seen it described as coming of age, but he already had the responsibilities of a grown man.

This wasn't a good fit for me.

Ashley Jackson and I are reading our way across America. We picked this one for AR. Follow her page to see if she agrees with my review. On to the next....Happy reading!

I picked this book up at a library book sale, and didn't have very high expectations for it. But after the first few pages I was hooked. It's a great sweet story.

"A Painted House" was my favorite of John Grisham's novels. Grisham's depictions of life in the '50s on a farm reminded me of one of my favorite authors, John Steinbeck. Grisham's prose is sparse but beautiful in this story, which involves a murder, but is mostly a coming-of-age story of the young protagonist.

Books are magic. Take this one, for example, it allows you to revive your childhood as a seven year old boy picking cotton in rural Arkanas, USA. I have never picked cotton as a child, but I harvested lavender and that's a pretty hard core manual labour, so perhaps I even felt like I could relate a bit. It made me think of my own childhood. That is not all, though. The way the book is written makes it very easy to relate to all the characters. In addition, the writer does a great job of transporting us into the past.


The narrator of this book is a young boy, but it doesn't mean that the narration is boring or lacking in perception. Some might say that there is no way that a seven year old could be as perceptive as the protagonist of this book. I would beg to disagree. There are a lot of seven year old who are very perspective and intelligent. Moreover, this boy (an only child) spends most of his time with adults (lives in a farm house with his parents and grandparents) so his clever reflections don't seem that far fetched. Kids who spent a lot of time with adults are often 'wise beyond their years'. Besides, Grisham was really clever with writing here, stopping at some points, making it clear that a child didn't understand something, but writing the dialogues in a way that we (as readers) could easily understand them.

Still, there were some instances where the child's reflections seemed a bit too mature, but if we imagine that it is a story of an adult who wants to retell the story through the eyes of a child (the way he experienced it at that time) then it is pretty much perfect. The pace of the novel is very pleasant. The characters really grew on you. It was easy for me to relate to all family members in this novel. The successful portrayal of this family (and even of family dynamics) certainly adds to the literary merit of this novel.

As far as historical writing goes, this novel is one of the best I've read so far. You can certainly feel the historical atmosphere. The characters do seem to belong to that particular historical time and place. Not only the words of the characters, but their thoughts and mental processes do seem to belong to that time. The setting and the descriptions are pretty straight-forward. The writing is for most part very simple. I don't mind that. There are a lot of details, though. It seems that Grisham is one of those authors who live by 'write what you know'. He does it very well in this one. Grisham drew from his childhood experiences to write this one. Nothing wrong with that. It only adds to the credibility of this novel.

A Painted House is almost a nostalgic work. I stress 'almost' because there are no embellishments or romanticizing the period. The farmers don't have it easy and most of them will have to leave the South to be able to support their families. You do get a feeling of being in a different place and time but not in a sentimental way. A Painted House feels like a very realistic representation of what life of a cotton farmer had been like in that time period. Nevertheless, it is a surprisingly warm novel. It manages to be emotional without being sentimental.

The only thing I didn't like at all was the ending. Since the ending is really important, that was a let down. I think the book would have been even better without the murder element. I don't think it is a spoiler to say there is a murder in this book, because this piece of information is listed on the covers itself. I won't get into any details, though. I will just say that the murder felt out of place. By the end of the book, I felt there was something missing. There was no closure. If there was no murder, then we wouldn't have needed a closure. Maybe it would have been better if the author kept this novel about the fate of that farm family (and maybe developed it a bit more)? If we got to know a bit more about the other son, the one fighting in Korea? Now, that I think about it, I'm not so crazy about the plot either. You have all these new interesting characters introduced, but we don't learn what happens to them. The things that were supposed to be driving the plot weren't of that much interest to me. I was more fascinated by the community and the family dynamics (the mother of the boy is a very interesting character).


Grisham is not wildly talented, but he is a pretty good writer. Reading his novels feels a bit like seeing a film. He has a way of bringing images to life and that's not a bad thing. I'm a bit torn about grading this one, because as the plot progressed I almost stopped enjoying it ( I won't get into details so that I can avoid spoilers). I can't say that I didn't enjoy the book at all, not even towards the end when everything seemed to fall apart a little. It seems to me that this novel could have been a lot better with a few small changes, but I'm ready to give it 4 stars even if I feel that the book didn't fulfill its full potential. To sum up, I liked both the characters and the setting but I cared little for the plot and the suspense it tried to create. The ending was a disappointment, but all in all, I do think this book is very good. As far as historical writing goes, it feels very credible.

I had forgotten about reading this one, until it became a recent donation to my Little Free Library Shed. I am now bringing my review to Goodreads.

Let me just say that this is not a legal thriller for which Grisham is typically known for – it is more a coming-of-age story.

I read that Grisham had originally serialized this in a different format in his magazine, The Oxford American, in a semi-autobiographical way, in which he shared about his growing up below the Mason-Dixon line.

Now, as a novel, it is set in 1952 Arkansas, narrated by 7-year-old Luke Chandler, the only child to a family of cotton farmers. The plot introduces us to a cast of eccentric characters including his father, grandfather, a hillbilly clan and migrant workers who work the farm.

We get a sense of the labor and weather of working a farm. And part of the weather includes the floods and tornadoes.

Grisham is trying very hard to keep readers from getting bored.

The plot also throws in an illegitimate birth, an interracial affair, and a couple of murders.

Grisham isn’t afraid to tell a story.

There is a folksy tone that is somewhat endearing. As readers we can’t help but feel hopeful for the future. That everyone will survive and do well. Especially little Luke Chandler.

The audiobook narrator makes this better than my own reading would be.

I am biased against 1st person point-of-view (thanks to the New Adult genre). But this book reminds me how great 1st person can be. And I can’t imagine this story done any other way. This is 1st person Luke. He is seven-years-old. He is always sneaking around and listening to things and seeing things he’s not supposed to. It was exciting. And then he’s got all these secrets. He doesn’t want to keep secrets but he has to. I enjoyed Luke’s thoughts and dialogue. His family is dirt poor but he’s happy. Luke finds joy in daydreams about baseball and getting a St. Louis Cardinals jacket. Luke feels lucky when he compares his life to sharecroppers who have no screens, no fan, and no electricity to listen to the baseball games on the radio. Their kids have no shoes.

I consider John Grisham the king of character development, and this book is full of it. Here’s an example: A poor family buys groceries on credit. Little boy signs the account book at the store for something he is buying. The store lady looks at it and says “Coming along.” She meant his handwriting was improving. I thought she was going to say something negative.

I smiled and enjoyed so many things during this book. At the end I cried, but it wasn’t a depressing cry. It was more about good things people do for others - or do for the principle of the thing. There was a very moving idea at the end – that no matter how dire your circumstances, someone else is worse off and would love to be in your shoes. I was also happy about Luke and his parents starting something new that was going to be good.

Some readers complained that some of the story lines were not finished at the end. I was ok with that. Sure I would have loved to keep going or have a sequel. But that was because the stories were good and I didn’t want to stop.

WHAT’S IT ABOUT?
Luke’s family owns a cotton farm. The story begins in September as they hire a group of Mexicans and a family from the hills to help pick cotton. The Mexicans stay in the barn. The family camps in the yard. The story takes place over the next two months as these characters interact and pick cotton. They play baseball. Some local bullies fight. A carnival comes to town. There’s a mystery about a pregnant teen girl.

AUDIOBOOK NARRATOR:
David Lansbury’s young boy voice and emotional interpretations were fabulous.

DATA:
Narrative mode: 1st person Luke. Unabridged audiobook length: 12 hrs and 7 mins. Swearing language: mild but rarely used. No sexual language or sex scenes. Setting: 1952 Arkansas. Book copyright: 2000 & 2001. Genre: fiction.

It's been a long time since I've read John Grisham. Oh wait. Actually, no. I did start The Partner a few years ago but it failed to interest me so I DNF'd it early on. But he did write one of my favourite legal thrillers, The Firm, which I devoured back when it was released. Unfortunately he ran his course with me by the time I finished The Pelican Brief.

Somehow A Painted House hit my radar recently. It was touted as one of his best works, and I'm always a sucker for coming of age stories. I wasn't disappointed. Clocking in at 460 pages, I found it to be a very fast read, and not only was the voice of a seven year old done well, so was the descriptions of what it meant to be a cotton sharecropper in early 1950s Arkansas, which I knew nothing about prior to reading this.

So, high marks for everything Grisham did. While it didn't hit the five star mark for me, it certainly was a strong four star read.

Read a third of it and nothing is happening. Boring as could be

2.5 stars

A very slow book. The story inches forward at a snail pace and not much happens. And every incidence worth noting is narrated by a 7 year old. This is a bit frustrating because the narrator is merely a passive observer and he doesnt contribute much to the story -- after all there is no room for much to happen in a 7 yo's life.

Perhaps if the narrator was a teenager or an adult, this would have been a much fun read. I rushed through the last 100 pages.

Nevertheless, for those who like Grisham and enjoy occasional reading, may find this good enough to finish at a leisurely pace.

I have to admit that I was reluctant to read this. It'd been sitting on my shelf for six or seven years staring at me but I'd read about eight Grisham legal thrillers and only found two or three maximum that were worth the trouble; finally I decided to take the plunge and get it over with. As it turned out I was pleasantly surprised by this coming-of-age story. Grisham has always had an empathy with children having unpleasant contact with an adult world and adult matters that they shouldn't have to deal with at an age when they should still be dreaming of things like playing pro baseball. In this case, the typical childhood fantasies and crushing reality come along with inexplicable violence and the economic near-impossibility and impracticality of trying to make a living from a small farm in Arkansas. There are no surprises or miraculous solutions here, everything has a sense of inevitability, but I liked it anyway.

Maybe 2.5 stars. I didn't really like any of the characters except maybe Pearl and the nameless, characterless Mexicans minus Cowboy. The characters were not well developed. Their sense of morality was all screwed up, even by the main characters. The seven year old did not have the mind or voice of a seven year old and for all of his moving from "innocence to experience" as per the book summary, I got very little indication of growth. I skimmed most of it because I didn't care enough for the story or characters to become more invested.