The Lawyer's Guide to Writing Well, Second Edition
buy bestselling books in print, audio books
|
 |
List Price: $21.95
Our Price:
$14.93
You Save: $7.02
|
| [ + Zoom ] [ Buy Now ] |
Book : Usually ships in 24 hours |
|
The Lawyer's Guide to Writing Well, Second Edition Customer Reviews
|
|
|
|
♥♥♥♥♥ |
Surprisingly Good
|
How good is this book? Well, I've put it on my shelf right between Bryan Garner's masterwork The Winning Brief and Steven Stark's famous and succinct Writing To Win. Like both of those books, Professors Goldstein and Liberman present a systemic approach to legal writing. They are brave enough to offer real-life legal writing duds as well as writing gems from practicing lawyers as well as judges. Only professors could do that. If a lawyer tried it, it would be professional harikari.
Their advice is more general than Garner's and more detailed than Stark's. In that vein, the book is a good middle-of-the-road guide for lawyers. Frankly, I was skeptical of a book written for lawyers by two professors. I thought they'd be throwing stones from their ivory towers at the litigators in the trenches. They do, but not so much we can't handle it. More importantly, their advice is mostly on the mark.
That doesn't mean they don't stray a bit from time to time. They spend the first agonizing 34 pages telling us over and over again how legal writing has been atrocious for centuries apparently never to change. So why should we bother with this book? And at one point they proclaim that lawyers too often are careless about punctuation. Poppycock, I say. In my experience, many lawyers obsess over typos and punctuation and completely forget to breathe any life into their arguments.
But those are minor flaws in a very good writing guide. If you know a lawyer, chances are this would make a great gift. Too bad I already have it... |
|
The Lawyer's Guide to Writing Well, Second Edition Books In Print, Audio Books.