Reading Challenge 2021: The Rooster Bar – John Grisham

Hello Lovelies!
Well, January flew by us and now we are into February – the month of love and pancake day. Today I want to share with you the book I chose and read for the reading challenge this month. The theme for February was February – Read a book by an author who was born in this month. I wanted to avoid the obvious theme for this month – love – and wanted to pick something that took me out of my comfort zone. This took some research and I am pleased to report that there are plenty of writers with birthdays this month – happy birthday to you all! So, I opted for The Rooster Bar by John Grisham. I have to confess that before this book, I’d never read any Grisham so when I saw his name on the list for a birthday this month, it was the perfect opportunity to rectify that. I must say, I feel a bit silly to be honest. Grisham is such a prolific writer, I almost can’t believe that I’ve not read anything by him. At least I have now and I am thrilled to also say that I really enjoyed it! As always, if you’d like more information on my reading challenge for 2021, please click here. I hope you like the review.

What’s it all about?
Written in 2017, The Rooster Bar is inspired by real life events happening in America chronicled in the magazine article ‘The Law-School Scandal‘. It centres around Mark Frazier, Todd Lucero and Zola Maal. Each are third year law students at Foggy Bottom Law School, Washington. Unfortunately, this law school doesn’t have a particularly good reputation – they seem fairly lax on standards and the firm is considered to be a place where students don’t get a rigorous education in law. Why would people study there then? Well, it promises the world.

‘She fell for the scam that easy federal money could make law school possible for everyone, and took the first bold steps that would lead to Foggy Bottom.’

At the start of the book we meet Gordon Tanner, Zola’s boyfriend. This character has a few battles of his own, bipolar disorder mainly, but he discovers evidence that Hinds Rackley, the lead investor and owner of Foggy Bottom (amongst other diploma centres) uses a complicated but technically legal scheme to gain millions dollars from unassuming students. Students end up in a cycle of spiralling debt with no job prospects at the end of it. Gordon wants to expose Rackley and show the world how he really is and the reality behind students falling for the glossy magazine adverts for Foggy Bottom and it’s equals. Gordon becomes increasingly more erratic and acting out of character when it is realised that he has stopped taking his medication. The three try and detain him at home so he can rest and recover but manages to leave one night, resulting in an arrest for a DUI. The three manage to get a street lawyer, Darrell Crowley, to convince the judge to release Gordon on bail. Gordon manages to once again sneak out from the watchful eyes of his friends and girlfriend, resulting in his suicide.

‘And now, with one semester to go, Mark was staring miserably at the reality of graduating with a combined total, undergrad and law school, principal and interest, of $266,000 in debt.’

The following pages after this are the most emotional. Mark and Todd are blamed for the death of Gordon because they were the ones who were meant to be watching over him. As a result of this, they each were finding their job prospects dwindling down to nothing. There were no jobs. The jobs they had been promised are withdrawn. They each decide to work for Maynard, the guy who owns the Rooster Bar. They also rent the office space above to set up their own fake law firm: Upshaw, Park and Lane. They sort themselves false identities and forged credentials. They are certain that this is the only way that they will be able to make any kind of money at all whilst avoiding paying any back to Foggy Botton. Zola is the most reluctant out of the three of them but likewise, has little to no options. She joins them.

Like any story, they’re successful to begin with. They have numerous victories in the D.C. courts. Zola suggests that they expand to reach out to personal injury victims. These cases tend to have good revenue but none of them have much knowledge with these types of claims. Mark locates Ramon Taper, who files a lawsuit against the hospital where his son died. The trio branch out to get some legal advice for this type of case and are reassured that the case is sound. However, Mark later learns that the statute of limitations has already passed, meaning there is literally nothing he can do. Unfortunately, what this means for them is that they can be sued by Ramon for legal malpractice and for giving him demonstrably unsound legal advice. There’s not a lot they can do, In fact their only option is to reveal with Ramon’s new lawyer, Edwin Mossberg, that he is not a real attorney. Legal malpractice cannot be filed against a fake lawyer, so remarkably Mossberg drops the case. However, the scheme the trio set up is now revealed to the D.C. Bar Association, meaning that time is going to run out for them, not that they know it…yet.

“These are mistakes, not regrets. Regrets are over and done with and a waste of time to rehash. Mistakes, though, are bad moves in the past that might affect the future.”

They soon realise that the D.C. Bar is aware of their deception, it’s time for a plan B. They hatch another scheme involving Swift Bank, a financial institution associated with Foggy Bottom Law School founder Rackley. It involves a class action settlement and is set to pay billions of dollars to defraud customers. Again, the trio create thousands of fake customers, filling in fraudulent claims on their behalf, with the hope to earn enough money to escape the US and the Bar Association’s investigation. However, they have forgotten the fact that the police will also be investigating them. Mark and Todd are arrested but Zola is forced to return to her parents home country of Senegal, to protect them from corrupt officials. With the money in her account from their previous work, she hires Idina Sanga who manages to get Mark and Todd released on bail.

Using the earlier evidence of the Foggy Bottom fraud, Mark and Todd manage to persuade Rackley to pay out the Swift Bank settlements at a rapid pace, including to those fraudulent clients they created. The result of this is that they accumulate a huge amount of money. They use it to buy fake passports to travel to Senegal. Whilst they are travelling, the news of the fraudulent cases begin to surface but by this point the money the trio have is secured. By the end of the novel, the trio clear their debts and have to live in exile.

Final Thoughts
As I said at the start, I enjoyed this book. It was a great introduction to Grisham and I will absolutely be looking for more of his books in the near future. I guess this is where I miss being able to mooch about second hand book shops – but maybe we will get back to that soon.

I hope you’re all keeping safe and well.

Big love all xx