Īccording to Grisham's official website, Grisham used his spare time to begin his first novel, which 'explored what would have happened if the girl's father had murdered her assailants.' He spent three years on A Time to Kill and finished it in 1987. Unlike Grisham's depiction, however, the Scotts were white and their assailant was black. Two sisters, Julie Scott, 16 years old, and Marcie Scott, her twelve-year-old sister, had both been raped, brutally beaten, and nearly murdered by Willie James Harris. In 1984 Grisham witnessed the harrowing testimony of a 12-year-old rape victim at the DeSoto County courthouse in Hernando, Mississippi. Grisham has described the book as 'very autobiographical' in that the novel's 'young attorney is basically me' and the drama is based on a case he witnessed. Harry Rex Vonner also appears in the 2002 Grisham novel, The Summons, and in the short story 'Fish Files', in the 2009 collection Ford County. Harry Rex Vonner and Lucien Wilbanks also appear in Grisham's 2003 novel The Last Juror, which is set in Clanton in the 1970s. Three of the characters, Jake Brigance, Harry Rex Vonner, and Lucien Wilbanks, later appear in two sequel novels, 2013's Sycamore Row and 2020's A Time for Mercy. A passage in The Chamber reveals that the events of A Time to Kill took place in 1984. This setting is also featured in other John Grisham novels. The story takes place in the fictional town of Clanton, in the equally fictional Ford County, Mississippi. The novel spawned two sequels currently, Sycamore Row, released in 2013, and A Time for Mercy, released in 2020. in May 2011 and opened on Broadway in October 2013. The stage production opened at the Arena Stage in Washington, D.C.

In 2011, it was further adapted into a namesake stage play by Rupert Holmes. In 1996, the novel was adapted into a namesake film, starring Sandra Bullock, Matthew McConaughey, and Samuel L. Doubleday eventually took over the contract for A Time to Kill and released a special hardcover edition.

Dell published the mass market paperback months after the success of The Firm, bringing Grisham to widespread popularity among readers. When Doubleday published The Firm, Wynwood released a trade paperback of A Time to Kill, which became a bestseller. The novel was rejected by many publishers before Wynwood Press eventually gave it a 5,000-copy printing. A Time to Kill is a 1989 legal thriller and debut novel by American author John Grisham.

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