I’m always mystified by lawyer websites that depict them standing in front of a huge bookshelf stuffed with rows of matching leather-bound books. These dusty books are merely used as a backdrop – a marketing signal that “I’m a serious lawyer.” Often, these books are inherited from an old, closing law firm. Of course, every practicing lawyer knows no one really uses these old books. Case law, like every other form of information, is quickly found using internet databases.
What’s actually of interest to me is what books are actually on a lawyer’s office shelf? What do they find interesting? What experts are they going back to again and again to improve themselves? Do their reading habits overlap with their professed vocation and legal area of focus? These are things I would want to know when hiring a lawyer for a specific legal matter.
So rather than just spout, here are a handful of books I’ve read over the past decade of criminal defense work that I’ve decided to hold on to. Each has made an impact on me – or – I find myself needing to refer to them every so often.