The perfect Christmas gift for John Grisham fans and collectors is now available at TurnRow Books through a charitable donation by a Greenwood resident.
The bookstore is offering rare first edition signed copies of many of Grisham’s works, and the majority of the proceeds from the sales will go to the Greenwood Shakespeare Project, a youth summer program provided free of charge.
Richard Beattie donated the 120 Grisham books, which he has been collecting for about 20 years.
“I read the first books, ‘A Time to Kill’ and ‘The Firm,’ and I got interested in Grisham, and him being a Mississippi author, and I started collecting the books,” said Beattie.
His collection started with one autographed copy of “The Firm” and took off from there.
“Every time he would come out with a new book, I would buy copies, and sometimes I would get 10 copies of the book,” Beattie said.
The Grisham collector had a total of 150 books. Then last year, he decided to give a complete collection away to a family member.
After that, he began to have a feeling that he needed to do something with the rest of the books more worthwhile than keeping them on his shelf.
“I needed to put them to good use,” he said.
Beattie, a Greenwood Little Theatre board member, had been impressed by the Greenwood Shakespeare Project participants and their performance at the “Shakespeare Summer Scene Fest.” So he decided to donate the books to be sold to benefit the second annual Shakespeare Boot Camp.
Steve Iwanski, director and founder of the Greenwood Shakespeare Project and manager of TurnRow Books, said he was humbled and grateful for Beattie’s donation.
“For a bookseller, your eyes widen to see signed copies of John Grisham books. Some are special limited edition leather bound books,” said Iwanski. “It’s also exciting, because Richard decided to donate the books for the Shakespeare Project.”
Iwanski said that for the Greenwood Shakespeare Project to only be under a year old, it’s been thrilling to see the idea of the program take off.
“Richard and other people in the community have really stepped up to make this happen,” he said.
The books are all on display at TurnRow. Some of the titles include “The Appeal,” “Bleachers,” “The Broker,” “Skipping Christmas,” “Gray Mountain,” “The Brethren,” “The Testament,” “The Last Juror,” “A Painted House,” “The Innocent Man,” “The Summons” and “Playing for Pizza.”
“TurnRow has not had signed copies of many of these books in a long, long time,” said Iwanski. “This is great for fans of John Grisham and collectors, and it’s also a great way to pique interest about the Greenwood Shakespeare Project.”
The Greenwood Shakespeare Project will present its Shakespeare Boot Camp this summer. For five weeks, participants will be trained in Shakespeare's plays and Elizabethan stage conventions, set construction, music, dance, and scenery and costume design. The Boot Camp will culminate in three nights of performances set for Aug. 3-5 at Greenwood Little Theatre.
All students from seventh through 12th grades are welcome to sign up. The camp will run Monday through Friday from 1 to 5 p.m. starting on July 3. Registration deadline is May 31.
To register, visit www.artplacems.com/shakespeare-project.
“I feel like things of this nature that are more arts oriented, performing arts, literary and music, those are things that are really important to the culture and enjoyment of life,” said Beattie. “I think it’s very important to support those sort of things.”
The Grisham books can also be purchased online at www.turnrowbooks.com.
• Contact Ruthie Robison at 581-7233 or rrobison@gwcommonwealth.com.
