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Planet Law School II: What You Need to Know (Before You Go), But Didn't Know to Ask... and No One Else Will Tell You
Planet Law School II contains 30 detailed chapters, plus addenda and additional material, that set out everything a law student must do to excel in law school...an absolute requirement for getting a good law job. It is completely updated, with analysis of hundreds of legal resources and the realities of law school and the legal profession. Its 800 pages are an exhaustive and unique compendium of material advice, and a precaution for the soon-to-be law student.
- GenresLawNonfiction
858 pages, Paperback
First published November 1, 2003
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
February 9, 2022
This book purports to pull back the curtain on law school and tell the student what she needs to know and no one will tell you. One of my co-workers, a lovely woman, swears by this book. Says it got her through law school. She heartily recommended it to a young co-worker who is contemplating law school. But, she averred to me, “You will hate it.” At that point, I decided I had to take a look at it.
I didn’t TOTALLY hate ALL of it. Just about 660 pages of it. 250 pages are pretty good. The first few chapters give some very good advice – advice I got before and during in law school – about moving from being a novice to a master; to understanding the meta-issues of the law; about studying. That’s good. Chapter 17 was worth reading. Honed down to those 250 pages of pretty good stuff, this would have been a good book.
But then there was the bitterness; the gratuitous attacks on critical legal studies and critical race studies; the monomania; and the sharp turn into Nazi analogies. If I have learned anything from my nearly 35 years on the internet, nothing good comes from sharp turns into Nazi analogies. More about that in a minute.
There is a thread in this book that is worth reading; it takes on the underlying logic of law that the Socratic method is supposed to lead you to and lays it out. It has some good practical examples of taking apart a fact pattern and finding the legal implications. He also does a nice job taking apart some sample exams, including a charming one based on the works of Frank Zappa. (188-224).
He also does a nice, if depressing, job of showing how the incentives of law school do not incentivize teaching. Which I do not doubt. But while the world would be better if our personal and professional incentives lined up; they often don’t. If you’re a good person, you meet your professional obligations anyway. Do the good work that’s before you to do.
But it also gives some advice that made me raise my eyebrows. It recommends not briefing cases, transcribing class notes, tracking your time, raising your hand, asking a professor a question, or helping out your fellow students when they asked for it. I did all that diligently and, PERHAPS coincidentally I graduated summa cum laude, got recruited to clerk at my supreme court, and have gotten to do work that gives my life meaning lo these many years. Worked for me. Briefing, transcribing, tracking time, raising my hand, asking questions, and helping my fellow students kept me engaged; kept me honest; helped keep my incentives in line.
As the book goes on, the ratio of useful stuff to things-an-editor-would-have-helped with shifts in an unfruitful direction. First, it is increasingly bitter as the book goes on. It asserts that “You aren’t supposed to learn anything in class – nor from the cases themselves. From the professor’s point of view, classes are, for the most part, just something to fill the time until exams.” (91). My god, that wasn’t my experience in law school. I learned much in class. I learned much from the cases. The book says that law professors don’t want the students finding the deeper meaning. (125). I went for the deeper meaning. I got lauded by my professors for that and a tidy exit scholarship from the faculty.
This may be because I went to a warm and fuzzy then-second now-third tier law school. It may be that I’d been a paralegal for a while. But with one exception, my professors taught. The book makes me think none of this poor guy’s teachers taught.
Second, the book is so freaking arrogant. For example, it asserts, “There is no way to prepare for law school other than ‘the PLS Approach.’” 362. Oh good god. That simply isn’t true. I did not do that. I did great.
It may have some good advice for a marginal student, or a slightly sociopathic one. But the book wasn’t written when I went to law school and I was prepared just fine. I was prepared for law school by working as a paralegal, by reading some basic texts, and by taking the thing seriously. I have a friend who is hella overprepared for law school by working at a court for five years. She knows the difference between a CR 12(b) motion and summary judgment. She knows the backbone of constitutional law. She’ll be fine. There are many roads.
It brings the grandiosity and bitterness together in a grand scale at 378-81. There, it defends how bitter it is by comparing it to the bitterness of the founders of MADD, America’s founding fathers, Mohandas Gandhi, and Simon Wiesenthal. That’s a grandiosity that’s really freaking hard to take seriously.
And then there’s things like this. In a tedious chapter on discrimination in the legal profession, he says “The other group that merits special attention is homosexuals. For homosexual women, there’s not much of a problem. For homosexual men, there is. I will not urge you to stay in the closet. Just don’t flaunt it. Your private life – including your sex life – is none of your employer’s business anyway. Please avoid an in-your-face attitude . . . unless you’ve found a law firm composed entirely of gays who cater to a gay clientele.” 639. Oh good god. Just shut up, Finch.
I did hate Chapter 26. It was hateful and unhinged. It’s an extended screed against critical legal studies, with special hate reserved for critical race studies (which, he literally says, is “best expressed” by extended quotations from Mein Kampf, 736-38), with special swipes at Jacques Derrida and Michel Foucault (“two of the most aberrant people who ever walked this planet,” he says at 726) and Lani Guinier and Gerald Torres (whom he accuses of either “abysmal” ignorance or purposeful exploitation of the people they claim to want to help, 739-44). I can’t even handle his discussion of the history of anti-Semitism (744-45). My fingers quail at typing the words.
In response to his imagined criticism that he’s blaming the victim he responds with “But there are time when victims deserve blame; hence, sayings such as “A fool and his money are soon parted,” “Those who live by the sword shall perish by the sword,” [insert other aphorisms here] . . . There are three possible explanations for the failure of blacks and certain browns to ‘get ahead in academia, whether as students or faculty,” he says. 750. He rejects the first two (inability and systemic racism) out of hand. I’d go with that second one myself. He instead embraces a third, “that blacks and certain browns are holding themselves back, through a culture that rejects the values of the Life of the Mind in general, and academe in particular.” 751. Oh good god man. You need yourself a better editor.
His misunderstanding of the feminist critique of the patriarchy is rather breathtaking. He says, earnestly, “male ‘patriarchy’ was a device by which the men of one family or clan protected their womenfolk – from exploitation and depredations by men of other clans.” 772. Right. By making women property and denying them full participation in society you’re protecting them. Right.
It’s often a funny book and there are bits I enjoyed reading. For example, on the Rule Against Perpetuities: “I shall not discuss it because it would get me too upset. Suffice it to say, it’s hard; real hard.” (99). That made me laugh, and yes, the Rule Against Perpetuities is, some extent, one of the secret masonic handshakes of the legal profession. Though once you realize it’s there to stop the old feudal families from keeping their land in their families by leaving it to people who don’t exist yet via estate planning, it’s much easier to master.
I also enjoyed the semi-gratuitous appearance of the actor Wentworth Miller (164 et seq.), for whom I had a completely unreasonable dislike for years based on his appearance on Buffy the Vampire Slayer (His character tries to rape her. She, rather gently, breaks his nose. Which gets her into trouble with the school. Frelling patriarchy.) (Later, the actor came out of the closet when declining an invitation to attend a film festival in Russia because of its anti-gay policies. He has spoken publicly about attempting suicide because of how hard it was to be a closeted gay teenager. that's heroic. And I’m enjoying his Captain Cold. So now I like him. Prosocial relationships are weird. Also, I’d much rather get a beer with Wentworth Miller than the guy who wrote this book). The man's father apparently wrote a guide to taking legal exams that Finch commends.
About 250 pages of this book are pretty good, but those pages are entangled with about 600 pages of bitterness, grandiosity, and monomania. I do not think those threads are healthy. Also, it violates Godwin’s Law. Don’t do that.
I didn’t TOTALLY hate ALL of it. Just about 660 pages of it. 250 pages are pretty good. The first few chapters give some very good advice – advice I got before and during in law school – about moving from being a novice to a master; to understanding the meta-issues of the law; about studying. That’s good. Chapter 17 was worth reading. Honed down to those 250 pages of pretty good stuff, this would have been a good book.
But then there was the bitterness; the gratuitous attacks on critical legal studies and critical race studies; the monomania; and the sharp turn into Nazi analogies. If I have learned anything from my nearly 35 years on the internet, nothing good comes from sharp turns into Nazi analogies. More about that in a minute.
There is a thread in this book that is worth reading; it takes on the underlying logic of law that the Socratic method is supposed to lead you to and lays it out. It has some good practical examples of taking apart a fact pattern and finding the legal implications. He also does a nice job taking apart some sample exams, including a charming one based on the works of Frank Zappa. (188-224).
He also does a nice, if depressing, job of showing how the incentives of law school do not incentivize teaching. Which I do not doubt. But while the world would be better if our personal and professional incentives lined up; they often don’t. If you’re a good person, you meet your professional obligations anyway. Do the good work that’s before you to do.
But it also gives some advice that made me raise my eyebrows. It recommends not briefing cases, transcribing class notes, tracking your time, raising your hand, asking a professor a question, or helping out your fellow students when they asked for it. I did all that diligently and, PERHAPS coincidentally I graduated summa cum laude, got recruited to clerk at my supreme court, and have gotten to do work that gives my life meaning lo these many years. Worked for me. Briefing, transcribing, tracking time, raising my hand, asking questions, and helping my fellow students kept me engaged; kept me honest; helped keep my incentives in line.
As the book goes on, the ratio of useful stuff to things-an-editor-would-have-helped with shifts in an unfruitful direction. First, it is increasingly bitter as the book goes on. It asserts that “You aren’t supposed to learn anything in class – nor from the cases themselves. From the professor’s point of view, classes are, for the most part, just something to fill the time until exams.” (91). My god, that wasn’t my experience in law school. I learned much in class. I learned much from the cases. The book says that law professors don’t want the students finding the deeper meaning. (125). I went for the deeper meaning. I got lauded by my professors for that and a tidy exit scholarship from the faculty.
This may be because I went to a warm and fuzzy then-second now-third tier law school. It may be that I’d been a paralegal for a while. But with one exception, my professors taught. The book makes me think none of this poor guy’s teachers taught.
Second, the book is so freaking arrogant. For example, it asserts, “There is no way to prepare for law school other than ‘the PLS Approach.’” 362. Oh good god. That simply isn’t true. I did not do that. I did great.
It may have some good advice for a marginal student, or a slightly sociopathic one. But the book wasn’t written when I went to law school and I was prepared just fine. I was prepared for law school by working as a paralegal, by reading some basic texts, and by taking the thing seriously. I have a friend who is hella overprepared for law school by working at a court for five years. She knows the difference between a CR 12(b) motion and summary judgment. She knows the backbone of constitutional law. She’ll be fine. There are many roads.
It brings the grandiosity and bitterness together in a grand scale at 378-81. There, it defends how bitter it is by comparing it to the bitterness of the founders of MADD, America’s founding fathers, Mohandas Gandhi, and Simon Wiesenthal. That’s a grandiosity that’s really freaking hard to take seriously.
And then there’s things like this. In a tedious chapter on discrimination in the legal profession, he says “The other group that merits special attention is homosexuals. For homosexual women, there’s not much of a problem. For homosexual men, there is. I will not urge you to stay in the closet. Just don’t flaunt it. Your private life – including your sex life – is none of your employer’s business anyway. Please avoid an in-your-face attitude . . . unless you’ve found a law firm composed entirely of gays who cater to a gay clientele.” 639. Oh good god. Just shut up, Finch.
I did hate Chapter 26. It was hateful and unhinged. It’s an extended screed against critical legal studies, with special hate reserved for critical race studies (which, he literally says, is “best expressed” by extended quotations from Mein Kampf, 736-38), with special swipes at Jacques Derrida and Michel Foucault (“two of the most aberrant people who ever walked this planet,” he says at 726) and Lani Guinier and Gerald Torres (whom he accuses of either “abysmal” ignorance or purposeful exploitation of the people they claim to want to help, 739-44). I can’t even handle his discussion of the history of anti-Semitism (744-45). My fingers quail at typing the words.
In response to his imagined criticism that he’s blaming the victim he responds with “But there are time when victims deserve blame; hence, sayings such as “A fool and his money are soon parted,” “Those who live by the sword shall perish by the sword,” [insert other aphorisms here] . . . There are three possible explanations for the failure of blacks and certain browns to ‘get ahead in academia, whether as students or faculty,” he says. 750. He rejects the first two (inability and systemic racism) out of hand. I’d go with that second one myself. He instead embraces a third, “that blacks and certain browns are holding themselves back, through a culture that rejects the values of the Life of the Mind in general, and academe in particular.” 751. Oh good god man. You need yourself a better editor.
His misunderstanding of the feminist critique of the patriarchy is rather breathtaking. He says, earnestly, “male ‘patriarchy’ was a device by which the men of one family or clan protected their womenfolk – from exploitation and depredations by men of other clans.” 772. Right. By making women property and denying them full participation in society you’re protecting them. Right.
It’s often a funny book and there are bits I enjoyed reading. For example, on the Rule Against Perpetuities: “I shall not discuss it because it would get me too upset. Suffice it to say, it’s hard; real hard.” (99). That made me laugh, and yes, the Rule Against Perpetuities is, some extent, one of the secret masonic handshakes of the legal profession. Though once you realize it’s there to stop the old feudal families from keeping their land in their families by leaving it to people who don’t exist yet via estate planning, it’s much easier to master.
I also enjoyed the semi-gratuitous appearance of the actor Wentworth Miller (164 et seq.), for whom I had a completely unreasonable dislike for years based on his appearance on Buffy the Vampire Slayer (His character tries to rape her. She, rather gently, breaks his nose. Which gets her into trouble with the school. Frelling patriarchy.) (Later, the actor came out of the closet when declining an invitation to attend a film festival in Russia because of its anti-gay policies. He has spoken publicly about attempting suicide because of how hard it was to be a closeted gay teenager. that's heroic. And I’m enjoying his Captain Cold. So now I like him. Prosocial relationships are weird. Also, I’d much rather get a beer with Wentworth Miller than the guy who wrote this book). The man's father apparently wrote a guide to taking legal exams that Finch commends.
About 250 pages of this book are pretty good, but those pages are entangled with about 600 pages of bitterness, grandiosity, and monomania. I do not think those threads are healthy. Also, it violates Godwin’s Law. Don’t do that.
June 4, 2007
This book may or may not have a lot of good advice for future law students, but reading it is made impossible by virtue of the worst writing and editing I've ever experienced in a published book. The writer is also an arrogant, unfunny prick who I'd like to kick in the balls. Maybe that's why he remains anonymous --- not because he's letting out the great "secret" of how awful law school is, but because he doesn't want to be publicly shamed for being the worst writer ever to pick up a pen.
February 28, 2008
It might be worth checking out Planet Law School just to expose yourself to its concept. I don't honestly know whether the "study everything before you get to law school" approach works because there was no way I could have disciplined myself to do that. I think I tried some, but there was no way I could read material without the context of a class. If you do take this approach it is virtually guaranteed waste some of your time, because professors teach the same courses very differently.
Also the book suggests you never get a hornbook and stick to commercial outlines and the "Examples & Explanations" series. I am a big fan of "Examples and Explanations" (because you get so few opportunities to actually PRACTICE - I also like the flashcards for this reason) but commercial outlines are often garbage and I like hornbooks a lot.
Also, the tone of the book is way too bitter for me. Atticus strikes me as hating the law and being a lawyer. I like the law, I liked law school, and though I'm still a "baby lawyer," I think I will like being a lawyer. I defend the profession, in any case. I don't care for the fearmongering.
Also the book suggests you never get a hornbook and stick to commercial outlines and the "Examples & Explanations" series. I am a big fan of "Examples and Explanations" (because you get so few opportunities to actually PRACTICE - I also like the flashcards for this reason) but commercial outlines are often garbage and I like hornbooks a lot.
Also, the tone of the book is way too bitter for me. Atticus strikes me as hating the law and being a lawyer. I like the law, I liked law school, and though I'm still a "baby lawyer," I think I will like being a lawyer. I defend the profession, in any case. I don't care for the fearmongering.
August 8, 2008
Is there a way to give 0 stars?
This book was awful. The author's voice is very pronounced and irritating. It is almost like the author is talking down to the reader.
I did not find this book helpful.
This book was awful. The author's voice is very pronounced and irritating. It is almost like the author is talking down to the reader.
I did not find this book helpful.
May 13, 2018
In short, "Planet Law School" is definitely worth the read.
However, you have to "get through" it. Atticus Falcon's style of degradation is, at times, just a little too much. He degrades just about everything about the law, especially the "professoriat." As someone who will attend law school soon, I think being skeptical and cautious is okay, but to read what often seems like a rant made me feel like I was reading angry Facebook trollers' comments. Although, Falcon's rants do highlight certain perspectives and clarify areas of law school that may be invaluable for someone who knows nothing about law school.
The reason I have put a high rating for this book is because of various nuggets of information and advice Falcon occasionally provides. There are many, many chapters or sections that may be irrelevant, but there are good suggestions, too. His proactive approach to law school prep is what resonated with me. The suggested books are great and I'm already learning tons from it - and I'm even having fun reading. I wouldn't be surprised if my time in law school goes the exact way he describes it, even after the years it has been since the book's publication.
The way I see it, even if the PLS approach does not help directly with the exams as he says it will, I'll at least be proud of knowing a lot more about black letter law before starting law school.
However, you have to "get through" it. Atticus Falcon's style of degradation is, at times, just a little too much. He degrades just about everything about the law, especially the "professoriat." As someone who will attend law school soon, I think being skeptical and cautious is okay, but to read what often seems like a rant made me feel like I was reading angry Facebook trollers' comments. Although, Falcon's rants do highlight certain perspectives and clarify areas of law school that may be invaluable for someone who knows nothing about law school.
The reason I have put a high rating for this book is because of various nuggets of information and advice Falcon occasionally provides. There are many, many chapters or sections that may be irrelevant, but there are good suggestions, too. His proactive approach to law school prep is what resonated with me. The suggested books are great and I'm already learning tons from it - and I'm even having fun reading. I wouldn't be surprised if my time in law school goes the exact way he describes it, even after the years it has been since the book's publication.
The way I see it, even if the PLS approach does not help directly with the exams as he says it will, I'll at least be proud of knowing a lot more about black letter law before starting law school.
July 8, 2020
Simply superb. This 800+ page book is the reason why I am NOT going to law school. It could be an excellent resource TO go to law school in that it adequately prepares you for what's ahead and gives you fantastic resources that you should read prior to even setting foot on campus. You will certainly have a leg up over the rest of the incoming class if you follow what the author recommends that you read prior to attending. However, the reality of what's said, especially about law school professors themselves, is enough to make somebody like me NOT want to go to law school. No wonder there were a few negative reviews of this book written by law school professors. They were called out on their shit!! Make no mistake, ladies and gentlemen. If you were going to read ONE book prior to going to law school, this is the one. It will also lead you to other books that are worth reading as well. With the state of anarchy in this country, you're lucky if there will be any laws left for you to practice with upon graduation! Get out while you still can! DEFUND LAW SCHOOLS!
March 7, 2007
This isn't a book, it's a manuscript in need of a professional editor. There's good advice to be found, but it's lost in a thicket of rambling prose, poor organization, and some of the worst typesetting/visual design I've ever seen.
March 14, 2009
Without a doubt, the best law school advice/introduction book I read. There isn't a topic or question an incoming law student is wondering about that Falcon doesn't cover. It's even something that is helpful to refer to during law school.
August 3, 2007
Blah. I gave up on this. Poorly organized, poorly written. And, besides, I've already survived 1/2 of 1L.
November 3, 2020
Very good book. If you really want to hit the ground running you need to read this and get started on his recommended reading list.
Read
July 26, 2010I do not feel like I have the necessary information to rate this book yet. I'll give it a star or two or ...? based on my grades in five months.
February 12, 2016
Want to re-read it and see how it compares now that I've been through two years of law school.
January 7, 2018
Solid content, painful to read due to the author's incessant commentary, cynicism, and stream-of-consciousness style.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews