John Grisham Reveals New Spy Novel 'The French Illusion,' Talks Genre Shift

John Grisham, author of 52 bestsellers, announced his new spy thriller "The French Illusion". He discussed how writing espionage compares to his legal thrillers and what drew him to the genre.

John Grisham, the man behind 52 consecutive number one bestsellers, stepped onto the "CBS Mornings" set this week to let viewers in on something he's been keeping quiet. He's written a spy novel. Not a legal thriller. A spy novel. And he had plenty to say about why he finally made the jump.

The book is called "The French Illusion," and Doubleday plans to ship 1.5 million copies when it hits stores September 29. Grisham told CBS he's been wanting to try his hand at espionage for years. When he's not reading legal thrillers, he said, he's usually got his nose in spy stories. He rattled off the writers who shaped him Ken Follett, John le Carré, Robert Ludlum, Len Deighton and made clear he's been studying their moves for a long time.

He also talked about what connects the two genres. "Many of the elements that make legal thrillers compelling high stakes, hidden motives, intricate plots, and shady characters also propel the best espionage fiction," he said. In other words, he's not starting from scratch. He's just moving the pieces to a different board.

The plot centers on a young American couple whose Paris honeymoon takes a dark turn when they get snatched during a day trip to the French countryside. The kidnappers don't make sense at first. Who targets honeymooners? It turns out this isn't the first crime of its kind, and pretty soon the FBI, CIA and French intelligence are all trying to untangle the mess while a young lawyer gets recruited as bait in an elaborate CIA operation.

Grisham has sold something like 500 million books worldwide, give or take. They've been translated into nearly fifty languages. His most recent novel, "The Widow," has spent nearly five months on bestseller lists and moved more than 1.2 million copies so far. So it's not like he needed to try something new. He just wanted to.

"The French Illusion" is his first straight-up espionage novel, and by the sound of it, he's been waiting a long time to write it.