Customer Reviews

Bar Breaker Vol. 1 and 2 (Set)

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The book is written by a San Francisco Public Defender, past bar exam grader and essay exam writer. He organizes numerous past bar exam essay questions in two volumes. He provides a strategy for organizing and solving the 13 essay topics and provides comprehensive model answers. The book demands an active learning approach and explains how an essay is graded by the Bar Examiners. If you want to know what's expected of you to pass the essay portion of the exam, this is the book. However, it can be discouraging to see how smoothly an experienced attorney can dissect questions even the best law students would stumble over. It just goes to show again that the most important thing I learned in law school was how stupid I really was and how much I had to learn.

You can ask me questions at frankcapwell at hotmail if you have any questions about this. Many people rolled their eyes at me when I told them I read NO outlines, wrote NO outlines, made NO cards, or did any kind of painful manual labor. I trusted in Adachi.

I passed on my first try, and to be honest, the examination was not what I hoped it to be, a let down of sorts because it simply failed to challenge me. Why? Because I studied smarter, not harder.

Have faith in Adachi's system. You will feel like it's not enough, but don't believe the hype. It is exactly what you need, so of course you will feel like you are not doing enough if you do what I did:

Everyday for a couple months I typed out multiple essays (5 at the most, 2 at the least depending on whether I needed to go over certain areas of law I missed) from the two volume Bar Breaker Series, I did ONLY AND ALL of the MBE questions from PMBR and Adachi, and reviewed the bar exam survival kit (yes it's outlines, but it works with this two volume set wonderfully and is laid out in the actual way you will write the essay itself, so your memorization will actually be useful) and I reviewed the bar cards at my leisure, which helped me learn community property and wills and trusts.

And to be honest, if I did not know the law, I would copy the model answer verbatim after carefully reading and trying to outline the question. So there is no excuse to not keep moving forward.

Towards the end, I could sit in a Carls Jr during the lunch rush and do 200 questions straight with no breaks in 2 hours and get 82% correct and TYPE out three essays in less than 2 hours.

That's it--because ALL I did was what I would be doing on the day of the examination thanks to Adachi.

Here is ALL I had at my fingertips, anymore than this spells failure (which I saw first hand, and I'm still bummed my good friend failed):

All PMBR books--red, blue and green

And

The entire Adachi System: Volumes I and II (A GOLD MINE), bar cards, Survival Kit, and the awesome MBE survival kit.

And the Adachi Essay Book, Bar Bri edition, that was a GOLD MINE too! It includes scored essays from 50 to 85 or so, giving you a glimpse into what you need to do and not do, I recommend that book towards the end if you can find one.

That is ALL you need to pass. I repeat, THAT IS ALL YOU NEED. THROW EVERYTHING ELSE AWAY if you already have the above mentioned items.

With Adachi, you are in a perpetual state of execution after you read the first 80 pages. If you are in a state of execution, and stay out of the comforting, but wasteful, state of preparation (making outlines and cards, trying to find an easier less painful way to do it, wasting time on the internet), you will pass. By the way, after you get Adachi's materials, I hope you stay away from the internet until after the examination--if you want to pass that is.

Best Regards,
Frank Capwell, Esq.

p.s. and for those who preach "everyone learns differently" like a mantra, remember that "everyone" will be doing the exact same thing and half of everyone is going to fail. It's doing it Adachi style that makes you a passer, regardless of learning styles.

I used these two volumes as a second time taker of the California Bar Exam. On my first attempt all but three of my essay scores were not passing. After focusing my attention on the process taught in these volumes I can say that I felt confident the second time and I attribute my success to it.

For those of you who are having trouble on the essay portions buy this book and keep to the scheduale. Although the scheduale is demanding the results are well worth it.

I have used the Micromash and the Celebration Bar Review courses for the California Bar. Neither of them uses the techniques that this book does. If you dont know how to write a bar essay after reading this book you have a problem! The book explains subject by subject how to attack the questions and how to answer them in a lawyer like fashion. Is a must! Dont spent thousands on couses. This book does it all.

I purchased this book after I read the Amazon review by the person who self-studied for the CA Bar Exam (Frank Capwell) and had nothing but praise for this material. Read his review and seriously consider his advice. I want to echo it a bit.

Personally, I wrote out more or less 70% of the essays in this book, wrote out more recent bar exam essay questions, found some old Bar Bri books with substantive outlines to study from, did a lot of PMBR multiple choice (in retrospect, don't rely solely on PMBR-type questions, I feel they do not reflect the style of the MBE anymore, I'd say buy old questions from MBE), used a Flemings Manual to prep for the Performance test, read books on CA Evid and Civ Pro and Agency and Partnership, and I managed to pass without giving Bar Bri or any prep class thousands of dollars.

Ultimately, you've gone to law school for three years now, you probably know the material. Not following the crowd is a gamble and it was sort of scary, but if you are up for it, then you need to use this book. This book gives you a strategy for each type of question. I felt very prepared when I was writing the essay sections during the exam.

One caveat, you have to look at more recent essay questions from the CA bar website to get a better feel for what they are asking (and how) nowadays. This book is a little dated (older essays), but the technique is totally applicable and transferable.

I would give Bar Breaker's an A for organization and inspirational ideas and an D for accuracy with respect to statements of law, both implied and express. Literally, almost every single "model" answer has either a total mis-statement of law or fails to discuss a major issue that is implicated by the fact pattern. I believe that some of these answers would not even receive a passing grade. There are even mis-statements of criminal law, which is kind of scary considering that Adachi oversees the criminal defense of every indigent person in San Francisco. I'm surprised that more people aren't pointing this out. I suspect that these reviewers might have some connection to the author. Just be sure not to rely on Adachi's legal analysis as accurate. For the exam tips, it's great. Also, it's very helpful to have the essays organized by category as he has done.

I still don't know whether or not I passed the CA bar exam, yet, but studying for it with the Bar Breaker set was one of the best pieces of advice I received. I took BarBri, which was helpful as a review of the subjects. But I was dissatisfied with their essay workshops. They just weren't focused enough for me and didn't really break down the essay questions in a style that helped me understand how to learn to answer the questions. Bar Breaker did it for me instead. I felt completely prepared and relaxed during the essay portion of the exam because of these books. This is money wisely spent - IF you can order the books before they disappear!

I was one of those law students who never got law school. The law did not make sense to me. I didn't know which rules were important and couldn't really do IRAC. I thought I was doing IRAC but then I read Adachi and realized I had been stumbling around in the dark.

I graduated ranked 90 out of 109 from a mediocre law school and was told by three professors that I would never pass the bar. And I did! I passed the California bar exam on the first try and I attribute it to Adachi. Write all the essays in the books, buy every product he has and just keep going. 2 essays, 25 mpc, and go throught 3 sets of flashcards every day for two months and you will pass the bar.

If I had read these books during law school, I know my ranking would have been different. It's not about reinventing the wheel, it's about being a sheep and copying great people who have passed before you- get the books and don't look back!

These books are a must for passing the bar.

He breaks the material down step by step and shows you how to put together winning essays.

Even if you are signed up for a bar review course, get these books along with his "bar exam survival guide" and you will be much better off.

good luck.

The California Bar Exam is a terrifying exercise in thinking like a lawyer and writing clearly. These workbooks give you a way to start breaking down the California Bar Exam essays into manageable parts so you can prepare to pass the essay portion of the exam.