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Avvo Top 5 Books Featuring Lawyers

May 13th, 2008 by Shalini
  1. A Civil Action by Jonathan Harr: I read this book straight through when it came out in 1995. It is a page-turner about a personal injury lawyer (and fellow Cornell grad) Jan Schlichtmann and his representation of eight leukemia victim families against W.R. Grace and Beatrice Foods. It is a David versus Goliath story, set in the modern day of complex litigation against large corporations.
  2. To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee: I read this book as summer reading when I was in high school. The character of Atticus Finch was one of the reasons I aspired to be a lawyer: “Courage is not a man with a gun in his hand. It’s knowing you’re licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what. You rarely win, but sometimes you do.”
  3. Barbarians at the Gate by Bryan Burrough: This is the story of KKR’s leveraged buyout of RJR Nabisco. Though the chief characters are not attorneys (no one could compete for attention with Ross Johnson, the then CEO of RJR Nabisco), there are many transactional attorneys who feature prominently in the book.
  4. U.S. v Microsoft by Joel Brinkley & Steve Lohr: Brinkley and Lohr were New York Times journalists who covered the trial from the beginning, and they write a compelling, highly readable book. Their reportage includes the incriminating emails, damning documents and verbatim transcripts that played such a key role in the trial.
  5. Conspiracy of Fools by Kurt Eichenwald: This is an engaging, riveting read about the rise and fall of Enron. It features key players such as Stuart Zisman, corporate counsel in Enron’s wholesale division - who warned the company in an early memo about the creative accounting and the legal entities being created.

Are there any great books we have left out? Leave feedback in the comments.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 13th, 2008 at 4:06 pm by Shalini and is filed under Legal News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

5 Responses to “Avvo Top 5 Books Featuring Lawyers”

  1. Cristin with Avvo Customer Care Says:
    May 13th, 2008 at 4:25 pm

    What!?! No John Grisham? and you call yourself a lawyer…maybe you need a top 5 books written by lawyers

  2. Four Pillars Says:
    May 13th, 2008 at 7:28 pm

    Thanks for the link!

    Mike

  3. Okorie Okorocha Says:
    May 14th, 2008 at 6:45 am

    I ready “A Civil Action” my first year of law school as required reading. I loved it. It really made me dream big and work harder.

  4. Venkat Says:
    May 14th, 2008 at 9:14 am

    My easy favorite is The Courage of Their Convictions by Peter Irons, it’s more just the story of a bunch of famous Supreme Court Cases and the litigants.

    The Brethren (one of the first “inside looks” at the Supreme Court) I particularly enjoyed.

    I realize I would like to read some more in this area!

  5. Justin Hein Says:
    May 14th, 2008 at 12:53 pm

    I agree. “The Brethren,” should be represented on the list. As should something by Grisham. I recommend, “A Time To Kill” - Grisham’s first and best novel. Well, at least that is how I remember it in High School.

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