James Grippando Wins Harper Lee Prize For Legal Fiction @James_Grippando

James Grippando, lawyer (Boies, Schiller, Flexner) and novelist (HarperCollins), has won the seventh annual Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction. The winning title? Gone Again, released last year, the latest in a series about Miami criminal law attorney Jack Swyteck.

More about the University of Florida Law alum from the ABA Journal here and the school's website here.

Attica Locke @atticalocke Wins Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction

Writer Attica Locke has won the Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction for her novel Pleasantville. The American Bar Association and the University of Alabama award the prize every year for the best novel-length work that demonstrates the ability of lawyers to make changes in society. More here from the ABA Journal.

Pleasantville (Harper, appropriately enough) is Ms. Locke's third novel.  She has also worked on the TV show Empire. Here's a 2015 NPR interview with Ms. Locke.

Harper Lee Prize For Legal Fiction Competition 2016 Opens

The University of Alabama Law School announces this year's competition for the Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction. More here at the website. Deborah Johnson won last year for The Secret of Magic (Random House/Penguin).

The Finalists In the Harper Lee Prize Winner Contest

Vote for this year's Harper Lee Prize winner here. (From the ABA's Journal's blog).  In the running: Michael Connelly's The Fifth Witness; Robert Dugoni's Murder One; David Ellis's Breach of Trust.

John Grisham Novel Wins First Harper Lee Prize For Legal Fiction

John Grisham's latest book, The Confession (Doubleday, 2010) is the inaugural winner of the Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction, bestowed by the University of Alabama and the ABA Journal. The Confession has received a number of very good reviews (Maureen Corrigan for the Washington Post, Barry Forshow for the Independent). Following the presentation of the award to Mr. Grisham in Washington, D.C. on September 22 at the National Press Club, David Baldacci will moderate a discussion of The Confession and Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird with panelists Morris Dees of the Southern Poverty Law Center, Linda Fairstein, author of the Alex Cooper mysteries, noted attorney Robert J. Grey, Jr., Dahlia Lithwick of Slate.com and attorney/author Thane Rosenbaum.

Here are the criteria for the 2012 Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction.

Entry must be a published book-length work of fiction that exemplifies the roles of lawyers in society, and their power to effect change.

Original publication date of submission must be within calendar year 2011.

Entry must have an ISBN and must be readily available for purchase in retail or online bookstores.