Rather than just graduate and study for the bar exam, Mark, Todd, and Zola all decide to ditch school - after cashing their final loan check, of course - and set up shop above a dive joint called The Rooster Bar. The grim reality worsens, though, when Gordy jumps off the Arlington Memorial Bridge, plunging to his death as his friends race to figure out how to handle their own situations. That’s especially bad news for Grisham’s main characters, who all owe around $200,000 in student loans. In fact, it turns out that less than half of the graduates from Foggy Bottom actually pass the bar exam. After presenting his pals with a wall of evidence - a literal wall of charts and diagrams that would make Wentworth Miller’s character in Prison Break jealous - they quickly learn that Foggy Bottom is just one of many diploma mills designed to generate big-time money and little to no future for its students.

Having been previously diagnosed with bipolar disorder, Gordy is now off his meds and playing detective - relentlessly searching for the truth behind Foggy Bottom and the school’s owner, billionaire Hinds Rackley, who stays hidden under a near-endless string of shell companies. Now, suddenly, just months from graduation, it’s Gordy who reveals the ugly truth - turning their dreams into debt-riddled nightmares. However, each of the four characters took on a ridiculous amount of debt to make their dreams become a reality. Originally, they’d all fallen for the promises of a great future and the exhilarating career being an attorney could provide. When readers first meet Mark Frazier, Todd Lucero, Zola Maal, and Gordy Tanner, the four twenty-somethings are all heading into their final semester at Foggy Bottom Law School in Washington, D.C. John Grisham takes on The Great Law School Scam in his latest standalone legal thriller, The Rooster Bar.

The rooster bar book review