Book 32: The Rehnquist Choice, by John Dean
Thank you to J for recommending this one. Very interesting, considering the nomination process we’re now going through.
Book 33: Free Culture, by Lawrence Lessig
Book 34: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, by J. K. Rowling
Book 35: When the Elephants Dance, by Tess Uriza Holthe
Reading blogs has become a harrowing experience since the new Harry Potter book came out. I’m terrified that someone is going to spoil it for me before I can read it. What if some blogger forgets to hide the sensitive information or it somehow shows up in the RSS feed? I can’t trust anyone–not even myself. When I recognize a post as being about Harry Potter, I have to jerk my head away and close the browser to ensure that my treacherous eyes don’t read anything they shouldn’t.
Seriously, I’m on edge here. I really have to read that book soon.
I’ve read these books, but I don’t really feel like writing about them. I’ll count them anyways. Take that, 50 Book Challenge!
Book 20: The Da Vinci Code, by Dan Brown
Book 21: Getting to Yes, by Roger Fisher and William Ury
Book 22: Getting Past No, by William Ury
Book 23: Clan of the Cave Bear, by Jean Auel
Book 24: Diary, by Chuck Palahniuk
Not as good as Fight Club or Choke, but better than Lullaby. Creepier than I expected.
Book 25: Blink, by Malcolm Gladwell
Book 26: The Tipping Point, by Malcolm Gladwell
Book 27: The Two-Income Trap, by Elizabeth Warren and Amelia Warren Tyagi
Book 28: The Crying of Lot 49, by Thomas Pynchon
Look, I finished a Pynchon book! It only had 150 pages, but I finished it! Woo-hoo!
Book 29: The Golden Compass, by Philip Pullman
Book 30: The Subtle Knife, by Philip Pullman
Book 31: The Amber Spyglass, by Philip Pullman
Okay, I’ll write about these three. But only to say that Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials Trilogy is an awesome series aimed at the young adult set. They are well written and enjoyable to read. There’s some anti-organized-religion stuff in there, but you can handle it.
Okay, we all know I’m not going to finish the 50 Book Challenge. If I actually had the whole year, it wouldn’t be a problem, but I’m starting law school in two months. I won’t get much pleasure reading done after August, and trying to squeeze 25 books into two months wouldn’t be much fun. Also, I don’t much like writing about the books I read. I feel like I need to say something intelligent or interesting (you can look back over the archives if you want to see how often that happens) and then I start putting off writing the post, and then I get a backlog of 7-8 books built up.
So here’s the plan. I’ll keep pretending to be doing the 50 Book Challenge, but I’ll stop caring about what I say about the books. You will continue to give me recommendations and will refrain from mocking me when I fail to finish the challenge.
Thank you for your cooperation.
With that said…
Book 19: Cat’s Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
Kurt Vonnegut is one hell of a cynical, pessimistic, insightful, funny old fart, and he’s one of my favorite authors. Cat’s Cradle satirizes religion, science, government, and just about everything else. It’s a fun read, even though it’s not Vonnegut’s best.
Did anyone else see last night’s episode of The Daily Show? Did Newt Gingrich actually go from pimping a novel about an alternate ending to the Civil War to basically admitting he’s running for President in ‘08?
I just thought the two acts were mutually exclusive, that’s all.
Extra!: I looked the book up on Amazon, and this section of one of the reviews cracked me up:
The key factor to an alternative history such as this one remains have the characters ring true. Lee continues to take advantage of the tendencies of his opponents and Grant refuses to back off not matter what the body count. George Armstrong Custer is always looking for glory while Pete Longstreet will always want to be safe rather than sorry.
Yup, nothing rings true like one-dimensional, stereotyped characters.
(Of course, this says nothing about the actual books. They could be quite good for all I know. I just wanted to mock this reviewer.)
CM passed me the “Books I’m embarrassed not to have read” meme. It’s harder than I expected. Last year, I would’ve been able to rattle off ten titles in as many seconds. I had been keeping a list of books I felt I should read, but one of my major goals for my pre-law-school break has been to cross off as much of that list as possible, and I’ve been making pretty good progress (see Moby-Dick, Catcher in the Rye, Farewell to Arms, One Hundred Years of Solitude, etc.).
So my list is pretty small at the moment. And CM took the general category of “philosophy” away from me. So here’s what I got:
The Origin of the Species, by Charles Darwin - Yeah, never read it. Feel like I should. ‘Nuff said.
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, by Hunter Thompson - Again, just seems like something I should have read. Never saw the movie, either. I know, I suck.
Gravity’s Rainbow, by Thomas Pynchon - I started it about a month ago, but I’ve given up. It’s too dense and challenging for me to get into right now, and I hate having to stop and look up a word’s definition every couple pages. I can see why it’s supposedly a classic; it’s got style like crazy, and it’s pretentious enough to make you feel smart as hell when you work your way through a section. I absolutely hate leaving books unfinished, and so this is probably the most embarrassing one on my list. I’ll finish it sometime, just not right now. Maybe I’ll buy the companion, but maybe that’s cheating. I haven’t decided yet.
The Things They Carried, by Tim O’Brien - People have recommended this to me since high school and I still haven’t read it. Oops.
The Joy of Cooking - I am not a good cook. I tried for a while, but it didn’t work out so well (and got expensive–well, more expensive than macaroni & cheese and rice, at least). It’s sad, really. Okay, I’m over it.
And I’m slightly embarrassed to admit that I hate David Sedaris. Everyone else seems to think he’s the greatest humor writer ever, but I don’t care for him. Actually, screw that, I’m not embarrassed. He’s not funny. Everyone else is dumb. So there.
I make it a point to never pass on chain e-mails and the like, and I’m not about to make an exception here. This strand of the meme dies with me. I won’t pass the meme.
But if I were to pass it on, I would pass it to Narkoleptik, Janine, and foxes. One person without a working internet connection, one who hasn’t posted for a couple weeks, and one who might actually follow through. That is, if I were passing it on, which I’m not.
Okay, so I finished Planet Law School II, and I see why people would dislike it. It is not a happy book, and it’s got a bit of a split personality.
First, PLS II aims to be a law school prep book. Mr. Falcon spends a lot of time recommending other books and materials for individual study, preferably before law school even begins. There is a large amount of recommended material here, but surprisingly little actual advice. What is there makes sense to me, however. For instance, he advises students to spend more time making up and thinking about hypotheticals than on the typical activities of briefing cases and preparing for class. When class participation is not graded and the final exam is an issue-spotter, this makes complete sense. Similarly, recommendations to keep main outlines concise and to make and memorize a one- or two-page summary outline seem reasonable.
But PLS is also–and mostly–a rant. Atticus Falcon is pissed. He’s pissed at law professors for hiding the ball, ignoring their teaching responsibilities, tricking students into thinking the wrong things are important, and not teaching them practical lawyering skills. He’s pissed at law schools for allowing the professors to get away with this sham, for raising tuitions to ridiculous levels, for not producing competent attorneys, and for funneling students into corporate law firms. He’s pissed at the ABA for preventing changes to be made to the system. He’s pissed at individual lawyers for being incompetent and immoral. He’s pissed at judges for not understanding the law, and he’s pissed at law students for not caring enough to demand a better education for their money.
The two faces of the book compliment each other, of course. The ranting shows us why Falcon feels such an intensive study regimen is required: in his mind, the system is set up to keep you in the dark, to trick you, along with 90% of your fellow law students into learning the wrong things and to keep you from becoming a competent lawyer. You don’t have any friends out there, so you have to learn it all on your own. In addition, the prep Falcon recommends (especially for legal writing skills and prep for the bar exam) aims to turn you into a good lawyer, hopefully one aware of the problems with the American legal system and maybe in a position to change things.
This isn’t a feel-good book. It makes you uncomfortable. It makes you feel bad about your choice of a career. Most of us are idealistic now. We don’t want to be told that this experience we’re looking forward to is meant to crush our spirits and turn us into immoral (or at least amoral) people. PLS II doesn’t prepare you for law school. It tells you that you will probably fail, and no one is going to care enough to help you. You start feeling like you need to set up a full-time study schedule right away. I picked up PLS to assuage my anxiety about law school. It certainly did not do that.
PLS tells you, emphatically and repeatedly, to buy a lot of other books ($574.50 worth for the first year, to be exact). It’s a hardcore system. Just look at the 12-month, 8-month, 3-month, and 6-week study schedules in Chapter 16 to see for yourself. As such, it seems more realistic than a rainbow highlighter system or other quick fixes touted by law school prep books. It seems right that law school success is complicated and difficult, not something achieved by a trick or method learned in a single book.
Falcon is overly cynical through most of his book. It seems over-the-top. Not all professors are trying to hinder your learning and turn you into a crappy lawyer. (I just can’t see professors moving from neutral, lazy indifference to active sabotage. Does that make me more or less cynical?) Law schools aren’t raising tuitions to force graduates into firm jobs (and there’s also no mention of loan repayment programs, which help counteract the huge debt loads for public interest peoples). I don’t know. Maybe Falcon is trying to convince us it’s better to be unnecessarily wary than to risk being stabbed in the back. I think the hyperbole detracts from the legitimate criticisms, though.
Aside from the (aforementioned) numerous errors and typos in the book, it’s too long and it lacks a coherent flow. Falcon jumps around from subject to subject, and there is no intelligible scheme to indicate main headings, sub-heading, and the like. In short, PLS needs a good editor. Of course, an editor would probably split the ranting off from the prep advice, if not remove it altogether (the chapter on Critical Race/Gender Theory seems to be an especially good candidate for this). I believe part of PLS’s purpose is to incorporate the two. In the guise of an advice book, PLS is an appeal to tomorrow’s lawyers, professors, and judges to think critically about the system they are part of and to maybe change it for the better. The thought is nice, but the execution isn’t quite there.
All in all, if you’re hardcore about preparing for law school, PLS will be useful for its reviews and recommendations of study material. Otherwise, you’ll get much less out of the book, as the cynicism hits ridiculous levels fairly often and there are better-written criticisms of the legal system out there.
I’m in the process of confirming what everyone told me: Planet Law School II is not really that good. Some parts are completely ridiculous. So I’m gonna mock it a little.
I’ll eventually get a post up about the good advice in the book (there is some) and probably a serious one about my complaints with it.
Begin the mockage:
There sure is a lot of italicization in this book. Lots of scare quotes, too. Seriously, man, we got into law school. We’re not idiots. We “get” your “sarcasm”, “homeslice”.
And there’s a lot of scare talk about how law professors try to make their classes confusing and the law difficult to learn. They don’t want students to become competent attorneys! They tell you to read things you don’t need! Sometimes, they’ll give your final on a completely different subject, just to mess with you! And they kick puppies! And they hope your first-born child turns out to be ugly! And dumb! Like you! In fact, the only way you’ll be able to keep up in law school is if you ignore everything law professors say and instead buy the PLS-recommended primers (pricing information included in later chapters). The only way. You don’t want ugly kids, do you? Do you?
In addition to italicizing every other word of his own writing, the author likes to emphasize things in his block quotes, too. Italics get boring, though, so let’s throw some bold in, too! Sometimes he’ll want to really emphasize something. Screw it, let’s give it the boldtalic treatment!
Some of the quotes have underlining by the original author. I’m hoping to run across a little underboldtaliclining, but I haven’t seen any yet. It’s a long book; I’m optimistic.
Maybe he should stick to quoting large chunks of someone else’s material when it is important as a whole, rather than quoting a block and then emphasizing the important parts.
Also, there have been a ridiculous number of typos and spelling errors in my book. Come on, at least run a spell checker over your writing before you send it to the printer!
At one point, Falcon mocks a law professor for misspelling “impostor” as “imposter”, even though dictionary.com says either one works. Considering the above-mentioned point, you might just wanna let that one go, man.
And I hate his font, especially the italics. The italicized capitals and lowercase letters run at different angles. Seriously, it Looks Like This.
Okay, that’s enough for now.
Book 16: Gideon’s Trumpet, by Anthony Lewis
In spring of 1963, the Supreme Court decided the case of Gideon v. Wainwright, which established the right of poor people to be appointed counsel in state felony prosecutions. Gideon’s Trumpet, published the next year, tells the story of this famous case, from Gideon’s self-represented trial and state court appeals to his petition for a writ of certiorari to the Supreme Court, the briefing, oral arguments, and immediate aftermath of the decision.
Writing for laymen, Lewis takes care to explain the legal process and to define the legal terms he uses. His focus on the people behind the case keeps things interesting, but the precedent and arguments contained in the briefs are discussed as well, so it don’t feel like you’re missing out on the legal side of the case. Not a bad read, even though Lewis does fawn a little too much over Abe Fortas, Gideon’s assigned lawyer (and future Supreme Court Justice), and the legal system in general.
Book 15: If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler, by Italo Calvino
Written in the second-person, this book follows the path of the Reader as he attempts to read If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler, the new novel by Italo Calvino. Unfortunately, there has been a problem during the book’s printing; the first chapter repeats over and over, so the Reader returns to the store to find an intact copy. This leads him to another book which is similarly interrupted, and off we go on a search for these novels that doubles as an extended meditation on the writing, publishing, and reading of books.
In other words, postmodern like crazy.
If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler explores, among (many) other things, the reasons people read, the expectations they have when doing so, the meanings readers extract from a book compared to a meaning the author may have intended, and the “reality” of a work of fiction. This may sound tedious, but really, it’s not. This is a fun book to read. Calvino is funny, the story line is entertaining, and, despite appearances, the plot is not terribly hard to follow. Some people might not be able to handle the lack of closure created by the ten openings that are never concluded, but for everyone else, I would definitely recommend it.
Book 14: Moby-Dick, by Herman Melville
I read Moby-Dick, not because it is a Great Book or something like that, but because I didn’t want to feel dumber than a heavy metal band. That’s right. Last year, a group named Mastodon put out Leviathan, an album loosely based on Moby-Dick. It’s actually really good, if you’re into metal-type music.
But anyways, I read Moby-Dick, and man, that is a long book. Melville must have done a ton of research for it; I learned more about whales and whaling than I ever cared to know. Told by a long-winded, digressive, and oddly well-read whaleman, the story jumps from narrative, to description of the whale and the business of whaling, to scientific or literary analyses, and back again. I got bored occasionally, and it was hard to keep going from time to time. So I’m glad I read it, I guess, but I don’t think I’ll be picking it up again in the near future.
On the plus side, I now recognize the quote on Class Maledictorian, and I did enjoy the moral I took from the story: Sometimes, just let it go, man.
Book 10: The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, by Douglas Adams
Book 11: Life, the Universe, and Everything, by Douglas Adams
Book 12: Goodbye, and Thanks for all the Fish, by Douglas Adams
Book 13: Mostly Harmless, by Douglas Adams
The second, third, fourth, and fifth books in the “Hitchhiker’s Trilogy”. The first book is missing because I read it last year and it wasn’t in the library when I checked. Basically, I just felt like reading something light and amusing. I’ve read them before, so I’m not sure if they should count for the challenge, but I didn’t remember much of them, so I’m counting them.
They’re amusing. If you’ve spent a lot of time around geeky types and still haven’t read the books, you might be annoyed with the quotes and “42″s and whatnot, but otherwise, pick them up.
Also, my girlfriend tells me (twice, ’cause I forgot the first time) they’re making a movie based on the books. It’s coming out soon.
Book 8: Franny & Zooey, by J.D. Salinger
Book 9: The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger
Franny & Zooey is actually made up of two related stories smashed together into a short book. Franny and Zooey are two members of the Glass family, all of whom seem to be too damned smart and too damned witty for their own damned good. The Catcher in the Rye follows Holden Caulfield, a sixteen-year-old sick of the “phonies” he sees everywhere, around New York after he fails out of school. It’s one of the better descriptions of adolescent angst I’ve read (not that I’ve read many of those). And it has nothing (well, almost nothing) to do with baseball. Not that I thought it did before I read it. That’s just silly. Hey, shut up! I don’t come to your blog and mock you!
Well, maybe I will now, jerk.
Both Franny and Holden are learning to deal with the ego, phoniness, and urge to conform they hate in others but still find in themselves. The books follow the different paths Franny and Holden take while trying to come to grips with these problems. They’re both quick reads, so it’s hard to say much about them without giving away something significant, so I won’t. They’re good books. Read them sometime.
Book : A Farewell to Arms, by Ernest Hemingway
Here’s a quote:
If people bring so much courage to this world the world has to kill them to break them, so of course it kills them. The world breaks every one and afterward many are strong at the broken places. But those that will not break it kills. It kills the very good and the very gentle and the very brave impartially. If you are none of these you can be sure it will kill you too but there will be no special hurry.
Yeah, it’s that kind of book. It’s a war book. Not really pro-war–it does strip away all the accompanying romantic notions of loyalty, honor, patriotism, and sacrifice–but it’s not really anti-war, either. It’s more anti-world. It’s a love book too, but still anti-world.
And yeah, that’s all you’re getting out of me. If anyone else out there hasn’t read Hemingway by now, I’d definitely recommend it. Good stuff.
The Supreme Court, by William Rehnquist (yeah, the Chief Justice!)
This book calls itself a history of the Supreme Court, but that’s not quite right. There is a good amount of history in the book, but it’s only one of three main topics covered. The Chief Justice only discusses the Court from Chief Justice Marshall (early 1800s) through the Warren Court (late 1960s) to avoid cases he worked on as a Justice, but he also writes about his experience clerking for Justice Jackson and spends several chapters describing the inner workings of the Court. So it’s not really a history, not really a memoir, and not really an insider’s account of the Court, but it has elements of all these.
The book uses influential Justices and important cases to show how the Court, despite its missteps along the way, has managed to take and retain its place as a full-fledged branch of government, despite repeated attempts by the other branches to control or intimidate the Court. Rehnquist’s writing is clear and interesting. Throughout the book, the Chief Justice aims the discussion of cases at the “interested, informed layman,” so it isn’t difficult to keep up.
The chapters discussing his clerkship talk a lot about the decision-making process and the personalities of the Justices on the Court at the time, but they have a different feel from the rest of the book. You feel like you learn something about Rehnquist’s personality as you read them, unlike the more objective historical chapters. This same split occurs when he describes the working of the current Court. At some points, he talks about the process he uses to come to a decision and write an opinion, and at other points he just dryly reports the days and times the Court considers certiorari petitions. It’s inevitable, I guess; the personal part of the book is not large enough to be published on its own, and it would be tough to reach the book’s intended audience without including some personality along with the historical parts.
As it is, the book is a good one for future law students. It exposes you, on a fairly shallow level, to some important cases and keeps your attention with the opinions, anecdotes, and observations of the current Chief Justice.
Next up: The Brethren, as recommended by chicken magazine
I just finished reading The Center Holds, by James F. Simon. It’s a look at the Rehnquist Court and how it hasn’t been able to fully realize the goals of Rehnquist, Reagan, Bush (the first), and other conservatives. The book is divided up into sections on race, abortion, criminal cases, and First Amendment law, and in each, Simon describes how Rehnquist was, time after time, unable to pull together a majority of the Court for his most desired postion. The centrist Justices end up carving out narrow exceptions and retaining liberal precedents, rather than overturning decisions and offering sweeping opinions, as the ultra-conservatives seem to want.
In each section, Simon looks at several cases, using drafts of opinions, oral arguments, and conference notes from several retired Justices to examine the process by which the Court arrived at a certain opinion, while working short biographies of the Justices in with the cases to keep things interesting. The legal terms are all well-explained and discussion seems to be aimed at laymen (nothing seemed too confusing to me).
It’s about ten years old, so it’s not quite up to date, but it’s incredibly interesting stuff. I think my Supreme Court obsession is alive and growing.
Book 3: One Hundred Years of Solitude, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
I liked this book a lot. I’m not big on buying books, but I’ll definitely get this one at some point.
There isn’t really a single protagonist; instead, the story follows the “life” of the city of Macondo and the BuendÃa family that founded it. Extraordinary, supernatural events are written about as if they were everyday occurrences, making the book feel like a tall tale or a story passed down from generation to generation. The main theme is, of course, solitude, but its variations allow the story to cover all sorts of emotions.
Ugh… I hate being so generic, but I don’t want to ruin the book for anyone reading this. It’s always seemed to me that book reviews are often written for people who have already read the book. They either give things away (I even dislike reading dust jackets–I like to go in blind, or as close to it as possible, when I’m reading), discuss things that won’t make sense until someone is halfway into the book, or are annoyingly vague.
I’m going with the third option, obviously. Anyways, if you haven’t read this book, check it out. Very good.
Book 4: Love in the Time of Cholera, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Wanna guess the theme of this one? (Hint: it’s not fatal diarrhea)
After One Hundred Years of Solitude, this felt kinda weak. It was slow starting and, because of the smaller scope, felt much less epic. It got better as it went on, though, and I don’t regret reading it. The chapters were really long, though. I like to stop reading at a chapter break, so this annoyed me a lot.
Decent book. Just don’t read it after something amazing.
And you all thought I forgot about it! Ha!
Book 1: The Daily Show with Jon Stewart Presents America (The Book): A Citizen’s Guide to Democracy Inaction
This is one of the funniest things ever. And it doesn’t swing as far to the left as the show itself, so it’s something I could see people of all political views enjoying (as long as they have a sense of humor, of course).
The book is organized like a high school government textbook, so it’s basically a bunch of humorous graphs, illustrations, side notes, and short essays grouped by topic (with “discussion questions” at the end of each chapter, of course). It works well, and the book really covers a good bit of ground. It’s easy to pick up for a few minutes when you feel like wasting time. And it’s funny. I mentioned that, right?
Book 2: Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, by Susanna Clarke
You’ve probably heard of this. Yes, it’s about magic. Yes, it’s set in England. No, it’s not Harry Potter for adults. Yes, it’s set in the early 1800s, yes, it’s long, and yes, there are footnotes. But they’re amusing, informative footnotes and you won’t mind reading them. Yes, it’s good. Read it when you have the time to spare.
I don’t really know what to write about today, so I guess this is a good time to announce that I’m working on the 50 Book Challenge. Basically, you’re supposed to read 50 books over the course of a year and write about them in your blog. I saw a few other blogs doing it and figured I might as well jump on the bandwagon. I’m actually hoping this will lead to suggestions from readers, as I’ve always had a hard time picking out things to read.
I realize this is getting into the realm of stuff people don’t really care to read about on a (pre-) law blog, but don’t worry. I’ll keep most of the entries short, basically saying a little about the book or author and what I thought about the book.
So the 50 Book Challenge will begin the next time I have writer’s block. Prepare to be bored.
And if you’re wondering what this has to do with law school… well, uh, eventually I’ll read some law school-ish books (One-L and such). So there.