“The Confession” is the kind of grab-a- reader-by-the-shoulders suspense story that demands to be inhaled as quickly as possible. But it’s also a superb work of social criticism in the literary-troublemaker tradition of Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle.”
The novel’s target — the death penalty and its casualties — derives from John Grisham’s other life as activist and board member for the Innocence Project, an organization that fights to exonerate prisoners it deems wrongfully convicted.
For more than a decade, in his novels (“The Chamber,” “The Innocent Man”) and on editorial pages, Grisham has ruminated over the efficacy and morality of the death penalty. “The Confession” bangs the gavel and issues a clear verdict.
As an advocacy thriller, it will rile some readers, shake up conventional pieties and, no doubt, change some minds. Whatever your politics, don’t read this book if you just want to kick back in your recliner and relax.
The novel opens with a classic noir situation in which an ordinary Joe finds himself suddenly thrust by fate into a nightmare. In this case, our flummoxed hero is the Rev. Keith Schroeder, pastor of a Lutheran church in Topeka, Kan. Sitting in his church office one cold morning, Keith is paid a visit by a monster.
Travis Boyette is a convicted felon, out on parole, whose rap sheet for sexual assault is as long as a fresh roll of yellow “crime scene” tape. Boyette tells Keith that he’s dying from a malignant brain tumor and that he (maybe) wants to confess to the abduction, rape and murder of Nicole Yarber, a high-school cheerleader from the small town of Slone, Texas, who disappeared almost 10 years ago.
After a couple of days of agonized dithering, Boyette shows Keith convincing proof of his guilt and the unlikely duo hatches a plan of action: If Keith drives Boyette to Slone — and thus becomes his accomplice in breaking parole — Boyette will confess to the authorities and take them to the spot where he buried Nicole’s body.
By the time the two men pile into Keith’s clunker for the ultimate road trip from hell, speed is of the essence. In less than 24 hours, Donte Drumm, a former classmate of Nicole’s, will be put to death for a murder he didn’t commit.
The most harrowing sections of this 10-fingernail-biter of a novel are the flashbacks to Donte’s arrest; the confession that was beaten out of him by frustrated Slone cops; and the chronicle of the years Donte has spent on death row, trying to clear his name and hold onto his sanity by reading the Bible and reimagining his plays from his days as a Slone High football star.
There are plenty of sickening twists and turns to come. It’s enough to say that Grisham doesn’t spare his readers or himself from gruesome experiences or hard questions.
At one crucial point in “The Confession,” Keith is forced to ask himself whether he would approve of the death penalty if Boyette, instead of Donte, were scheduled to receive a lethal injection of muscle relaxer to stop his heart.
By the time you finish reading this book, you may well find that your answer, like Keith’s, is different from the one you would have given before this darkly brilliant narrative began.
FICTION
The Confession
by John Grisham, $28.95
