John Grisham openly disdains insurance companies. One of the many reasons that Jake Brigance in A Time to Kill (1989) hates the Sullivan firm is their association with the insurance industry: "Their clients were insurance companies who generally preferred not to go to trial and would pay by the hour for legal maneuvering designed solely to keep the cases away from juries. It would be cheaper and fairer to pay a reasonable settlement and avoid both litigation and the parasitic defense firms like Sullivan & O'Hare, but the insurance companies and their adjusters were too stupid and cheap . . ." Grisham speaking as himself is equally unkind to the industry. He describes The Rainmaker to a reporter from his new hometown paper, the Charlottesville Daily Progress (April 14, 1995), as "a frontal assault on the insurance industry. I sued them for 10 years so I don't have any affection for them." As The...