Brush With the Law (Hardcover)

by Robert Byrnes (Author), Jaime Marquart (Author) "Dumb people do go to Harvard Law School..." (more)
Key Phrases: The Kankoos, The Parlour, Davis Mund (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal
Byrnes and Marquart, 1998 law school graduates (Stanford and Harvard, respectively), have fun debunking their law studies. This account of their three years in law school includes a mishmash of incidents that touch on both the funny and the serious sides of life. Some readers will enjoy their tongue-in-cheek tale, while others will question its purpose. The truth of the opinions ventured here e.g., that to a legal realist, the question whether abortion is constitutionally protected is all about whether the deciding judge prefers it to be available remains open to debate. These authors found that in law school they did not need to devote themselves to their studies, and one wonders whether the majority of law school students and graduates can relate. Not for law collections, though libraries with large humor collections might consider. Leroy Hommerding, Fort Myers Beach Lib. Dist., FL
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Movies and books such as Paper Chase perpetuate the mystique surrounding law school. Byrnes and Marquart, two young men who embarked on legal educations at opposite coasts, completely debunk the myth. Byrnes had political aspirations, and after a shaky start as a speech writer, he decided to give law school a try, opting for the mountainous Stanford. A student of little means, Marquart was thrilled to be accepted at Harvard Law, where he first felt intimidated by the privileged who populated the hallowed halls but soon learned how to play and beat the system, even graduating cum laude. Surrounded by an eclectic mix of companions, the two students eked by, focusing on enjoying life, including gambling, drugs, alcohol, and girls, much of their debauchery funded by student loans. Surprisingly, both end up at a prestigious Los Angeles law firm, where they met and decided to recount their stories in book form. Their craftiness at sailing through law school should make them good lawyers as well. Mary Frances Wilkens
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 336 pages
• Publisher: Renaissance Books; 1 edition (January 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1580631789
• ISBN-13: 978-1580631785
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars See all reviews (33 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #262,721 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

  Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

  #45 in	Books > Professional & Technical > Law > Specialties > Educational Law & Legislation
  #45 in	Books > Nonfiction > Law > Specialties > Educational Law & Legislation

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars This book is to law school as teasers are to movies, March 18, 2004

By	A Middle-Aged Lawyer (New York, NY United States) - See all my reviews

but I don't mean that as an insult! I just finished reading it in serialized form, published weekly in an online news service for lawyers in New York, and I admit I looked forward to each installment as a welcome distraction from the reality of the actual practice of big firm law. From the perspective of someone who graduated from an Ivy League college and law school more than twenty years ago and who has been working as a Wall Street lawyer ever since, though, I feel it's important to say that this book really, truly does not tell you very much about what it is like to be a lawyer or what parts of law school will end up making a difference later on in your career. How could it? The authors are still quite young and haven't seen their own stories play out. All we know is that they managed to graduate and get jobs as associates at a good, if rather idiosyncratic litigation boutique in LA. (Loved the bits about Urquhart's unique recruiting style! Kids, don't try this at home!) So they are still in Chapter 2 of their careers; the whole book covers only Chapter 1, law school. I think that some of the "lessons" they learned or impart are going to look different with the passage of time. Chapter 5, including their 25th law school reunion, should be a hoot, but I'm worried about what happens to them in Chapters 3 and 4. I agree with other posters that there is a strong '90's feel to their stories, I don't think the zeitgeist is the same today. Their discovery that you can coast at Harvard or Stanford or similar places is not particularly amazing, most people learn that as undergraduates, it's not really a law school thing and has been going on for at least a couple of centuries in Harvard's case. Byrnes has guts talking about smoking crack but that's a fairly unusual habit for a law student, let's face it, it's a truly bad idea and he is darn lucky he survived it. But I admire these fellows for their honesty and for capturing something real. I enjoyed the book and came to like the narrators, warts and all. Mostly I recommend it as a good antidote to that awful relic of a book One L for people thinking about going to law school -- just keep them both in perspective, the reality for normal people lies somewhere in between.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fear and Loathing in Law School, October 22, 2003

By	Lukas Jackson (Los Angeles, California United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

"Brush with the Law" completely debunks the law school myth established by "The Paper Chase" and "One L," and reveals the grim reality behind top-tier law schools. In "One L," Turow supposedly studies 15 hours per day and "learns to love the law" (blech). In "Brush with the Law," Marquart and Byrnes ignore law school until the night before finals, and spend most of their time smoking crank and gambling away their student aid.

While most law students probably don't smoke crank (at least I didn't), a lot of things in this book are right-on. First, the fixation on the bell curve of grades. GPA, Law Review, and big firm jobs become determinants of social worth. The social scene is so small and insular that gossip and cliques become as big a deal as they were in high school. Marquart and Byrnes don't buy the B.S., and their outsider perspective on this soul-sucking gamesmanship made me empathize with them as kindred spirits.

That said, the ending left something to be desired. We're brought to the brink of existentialist nihilism, but then the authors have "epiphanies" at the end that seem unconvincing and slapped-on. Read this book for the take on law school, not for the ending.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Law School = World, June 17, 2002

By	"dubai_law" (Houston, Texas United States) - See all my reviews

Marquart (Harvard Law) and Byrnes (Stanford Law) confess to an astounding variety of crimes, blunders, and fears in this voyeur's delight. Brush with the Law, along with Scott Gaille's (Univ. of Chicago Law) "fictional" account of similar events in The Law Review, are both recent attempts at portraying the steamier (and often darker) side of life at the nation's top law schools. Though most law students will not have the opportunity to sample crack cocaine and orgies, Marquart's and Byrnes' tales of decadence show that the range of human experience exists as richly (or poorly) behind ivy-covered walls as it does elsewhere in society.