The Green Mile

“It’s an immensely courageous book for such a famous author to write. It’s written from the perspective of the warder, whose job is to supervise death row and the execution of prisoners. The story is ultimately about a guy called John Coffey, a Christ-like figure who gets executed.It’s a magical realist book in some ways, but in other ways it’s an intensely realistic book about many of the aspects of death row. It’s set in the thirties, in 1932 I think. Conditions are a bit different these days but the process of execution is very similar. I came at this book with a prejudice because, although I think he’s a brilliant writer, I hate scary books of the type that Stephen King often writes. My prejudices were proven very wrong.” Read more...

The best books on Capital Punishment

Clive Stafford Smith, Lawyer