Eric Zyla

The Renegade Lawyer: Legal Humor for Law Students, Attorneys, and Other Interested Third Parties Eric Zyla

The Renegade Lawyer satirizes today's legal profession, putting a smile on your face or leaving you laughing out loud. Rather than collecting stories of widows leaving their fortunes to their cats or stupid cases from the 1800s, this book tackles such topics as how majoring in political science is pointless, how the way the law is taught (the Socratic method) would have Socrates turning over in his grave, how to lose friends by constantly arguing and nitpicking (important legal skills), how court decisions result from what the judge had for breakfast, and how stress becomes a lawyer's constant companion. The book offers advice based on actual experiences, such as don't wear short pants to a luncheon with your law school dean or slippers in your law firm partner's office. One chapter teaches you how to write rejection letters to law firms before they reject you while another chapter suggests movies to watch to overcome law school burnout. To test your legal acumen after each chapter, there are short quizzes with wacky questions. Is true romance possible for a law student or lawyer? Can you really lose 20 pounds your first semester of law school eating nothing but Mint Milano cookies? Is a law firm more like Ancient Rome, the Dark Ages, or the Klingon Empire? How can the rule No Horses in the Park mean that a pony can be in the park but a zebra can't? Is double-billing evil? The book starts by asking whether a lawyer can smile and continues with an overall jocular tone. As the subtitle suggests, the Renegade Lawyer makes a nice gift of legal humor for prospective law students, lawyers, or other people who simply enjoy seeing the legal profession lampooned.