It’s the birthday of John Grisham (b. 1955), whose legal thrillers have sold about 300 million copies and who is the tenth richest author in the world, worth about $300 million (nice symmetry there).

Grisham was born in Jonesboro, Arkansas, and grew up in Southaven, Mississippi. His mother encouraged reading, and he loved Mark Twain; he claimed in an interview that Tom Sawyer always inspired him to “go out and do something low-level naughty, just like him.” Grisham studied at Mississippi State University, got his law degree from the University of Mississippi School of Law, and then practiced criminal law; he also served in the Mississippi state legislature. Grisham was inspired to write his first novel, A Time to Kill (1989), while watching a trial involving a young girl who’d been raped; in the novel, Grisham writes about a black man on trial for killing his daughter’s white rapists. The novel was rejected nearly 30 times before being published but it didn’t sell well. However, Grisham’s next novel, The Firm (1991), hit the bestseller lists within weeks, and A Time to Kill then sold several million copies. The Firm is about a top law school graduate who unwittingly joins a law firm in the grips of the Mafia. (I hate it when that happens.) About 10 of Grisham’s novels, including these first two, have been adapted for film.

Some of Grisham’s other legal thrillers include The Pelican Brief (1992), The Client (1993), Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets* (2002), The Runaway Jury (1996), and more novels entitled The [Legal Term Goes Here], including The Reckoning (2018). Grisham has written a number of works outside the genre he’s known for, including A Painted House (2001), about a young farm boy’s loss of innocence; this novel was inspired by Grisham’s own life. He’s also written a series of YA novels beginning with Theodore Boone: Kid Lawyer (2010), hoping both to interest kids in reading and to subtly teach them about law; his daughter has used these books in her fifth grade class.

Grisham has been married to Renee Jones since 1981; they have two children, the daughter who’s a teacher and a son who’s a lawyer. Grisham once tried writing a sex scene, gave it to his wife to read, and when she laughed her head off, decided he wouldn’t try that again. (Well done, Jones, keeping him humble.) He has always loved baseball and has funded a baseball park, Cove Creek Park, for kids outside Charlottesville, Virginia, near one of his residences, but his name appears nowhere on the park. More evidence of humility: he reportedly still listens to his editor.

Have an inspired Friday and stay scrupulously honest to the data.

*I may have gotten this one wrong. It’s surprisingly hard to tease apart these bestselling authors.