A Time to Kill was published by Wynwood Press in 1989, with a first printing of only 5,000 copies — most of which Grisham bought himself and sold from the trunk of his car. The novel tells the story of Carl Lee Hailey, a Black man in fictional Ford County, Mississippi, who shoots and kills the two white men who raped his ten-year-old daughter, and of Jake Brigance, the young white lawyer who defends him.
Grisham drew on his experience as a Mississippi state legislator and small-town lawyer to create a courtroom drama that is also a novel about race in the Deep South. The legal question (is a father justified in killing his daughter’s rapists?) is inseparable from the racial question (would a white father who did the same thing be treated differently by the justice system?). Grisham does not flinch from either dimension: the racial politics of the trial — the Klan, the NAACP, the all-white jury, the white judge — are rendered with unflinching specificity.
The novel’s commercial failure on initial publication makes its first edition one of the most collectible modern books. After The Firm became a massive bestseller in 1991, Dell republished A Time to Kill in paperback, and it sold millions — but the original Wynwood Press hardcover remains scarce and valuable.
Collecting A Time to Kill
First edition (Wynwood Press, New York, 1989): Black cloth boards, dust jacket. Print run of approximately 5,000.
Market values:
- First edition, fine in fine jacket: $4,000–$10,000
- Signed first edition: $8,000–$20,000
- Without jacket, good condition: $500–$1,500
- Dell paperback first printing (1992): $10–$25
This is one of the most valuable modern first editions due to the tiny initial print run and Grisham’s subsequent enormous popularity. Condition is critical — most surviving copies show wear from Grisham’s trunk-of-car sales period.