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Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 3:31 pm
by northwood
what are your opinions about the book? For those in law school who have read it, is the advice good? I just orderded it from amazon and would like to see what others thought about the book.

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 3:32 pm
by Cavalier
I think you should read "Getting to the Right Forum" first.

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 3:33 pm
by Fresh
Cavalier wrote:I think you should read "Getting to the Right Forum" first.
:lol:

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 3:33 pm
by dshirs32
Cavalier wrote:I think you should read "Getting to the Right Forum" first.
hahaha +1

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 4:05 pm
by kalvano
northwood wrote:what are your opinions about the book? For those in law school who have read it, is the advice good? I just orderded it from amazon and would like to see what others thought about the book.

It's good. Read it halfway through the semester.

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 4:17 pm
by Borhas
you'd be better off outlining or doing practice exams than reading it... frankly there's no reason you need more than a few pages to explain what the book does... so it might be beneficial to read a few chapters then just stop (what I did)

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 4:22 pm
by joeshmo39
It's worth reading but not until you have 6 or so weeks of school under your belt. It's pretty easy to read and fairly short.

P.S. Guys, give him a break, he only has 2000+ posts. How can he possibly figure out what forum does what.

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 4:43 pm
by northwood
thanks for the responses. I just orderded Hooked on Phonics how to figure out which forum to post questions on TLS a few minutes ago. Hopefully that will help with future questions that I may have

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 4:50 pm
by Kilpatrick
I found Getting to Maybe invaluable. I read it once before law school and again a month or so before finals.

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 6:58 pm
by concurrent fork
Kilpatrick wrote:I found Getting to Maybe invaluable. I read it once before law school and again a month or so before finals.
+1
Especially the section on policy questions.

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 7:21 pm
by Kiersten1985
concurrent fork wrote:
Kilpatrick wrote:I found Getting to Maybe invaluable. I read it once before law school and again a month or so before finals.
+1
Especially the section on policy questions.
+180. I recommend it to everyone. People say it's redundant, but it's such an easy read that I don't think it could possible "waste" that much of your time. I also advise marking it up and flagging stuff so you can quickly refer back to things during the semester. Personally, I found it helpful to read it once before law school because it helped me pick up what was and wasn't important in class from the beginning. You should always be thinking: will this help me on the exam?

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 9:04 pm
by Top14Hope
I loved it! Definitely worth the short amount of time it takes to read it. And for those of you who said you stopped reading what was quite frankly a short and easy read, are you sure law is for you? Do yourself a favor and finish reading!

K love you bye

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 9:09 pm
by BruceWayne
I personally don't think it's particularly valuable before you reach law school. LEEWS is a much better choice for understanding how to take a law school exam for someone who's never stepped foot in a law school class. I'd do the LEEWS audio program before law school and I'd read Getting to Maybe about 6 weeks before exams. LEEWS is awesome.

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 9:11 pm
by AreJay711
BruceWayne wrote:I personally don't think it's particularly valuable before you reach law school. LEEWS is a much better choice for understanding how to take a law school exam for someone who's never stepped foot in a law school class. I'd do the LEEWS audio program before law school and I'd read Getting to Maybe about 6 weeks before exams. LEEWS is awesome.
This is what you mean by LEEWS, right?

http://www.leews.com/

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 11:39 pm
by kalvano
BruceWayne wrote:I personally don't think it's particularly valuable before you reach law school. LEEWS is a much better choice for understanding how to take a law school exam for someone who's never stepped foot in a law school class. I'd do the LEEWS audio program before law school and I'd read Getting to Maybe about 6 weeks before exams. LEEWS is awesome.

LEEWS:

Divide everything into sections - 1 party versus 1 party.
Make headers - Winken versus Blinken, "Battery", "Assault", "Trespass to Chattel"
Analyze Blenderize.


There, I just saved everyone $200 or whatever it costs.

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 11:42 pm
by BruceWayne
kalvano wrote:
BruceWayne wrote:I personally don't think it's particularly valuable before you reach law school. LEEWS is a much better choice for understanding how to take a law school exam for someone who's never stepped foot in a law school class. I'd do the LEEWS audio program before law school and I'd read Getting to Maybe about 6 weeks before exams. LEEWS is awesome.

LEEWS:

Divide everything into sections - 1 party versus 1 party.
Make headers - Winken versus Blinken, "Battery", "Assault", "Trespass to Chattel"
Analyze Blenderize.


There, I just saved everyone $200 or whatever it costs.
There's a lot more to it than that. Those are just the basics; besides Miller himself says that students often get too mesmerized with the blender and fail to realize that his section on analysis is actually the most important part.

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 11:44 pm
by kalvano
BruceWayne wrote:
kalvano wrote:
BruceWayne wrote:I personally don't think it's particularly valuable before you reach law school. LEEWS is a much better choice for understanding how to take a law school exam for someone who's never stepped foot in a law school class. I'd do the LEEWS audio program before law school and I'd read Getting to Maybe about 6 weeks before exams. LEEWS is awesome.

LEEWS:

Divide everything into sections - 1 party versus 1 party.
Make headers - Winken versus Blinken, "Battery", "Assault", "Trespass to Chattel"
Analyze Blenderize.


There, I just saved everyone $200 or whatever it costs.
There's a lot more to it than that. Those are just the basics; besides Miller himself says that students often get too mesmerized with the blender and fail to realize that his section on analysis is actually the most important part.
GTM sums up everything that LEEWS says in a much more succinct and relevant fashion. You just have to be a few weeks in to law school to fully grasp GTM.

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Thu Jan 20, 2011 11:45 pm
by NZA
Just got it yesterday! :) It's interesting to read. Of almost no real use to me right now, since I'm a 0L, but it's actually kind of pleasant light reading. Pretty engaging. Can't honestly say how much of a help it will be, yet, but I think you could spend $30 on worse things.

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Fri Jan 21, 2011 1:46 am
by Bronte
kalvano wrote:
BruceWayne wrote:I personally don't think it's particularly valuable before you reach law school. LEEWS is a much better choice for understanding how to take a law school exam for someone who's never stepped foot in a law school class. I'd do the LEEWS audio program before law school and I'd read Getting to Maybe about 6 weeks before exams. LEEWS is awesome.

LEEWS:

Divide everything into sections - 1 party versus 1 party.
Make headers - Winken versus Blinken, "Battery", "Assault", "Trespass to Chattel"
Analyze Blenderize.


There, I just saved everyone $200 or whatever it costs.
It's a $25 book. The main point of the book is "forking": written exams are not about coming to right answers, but about finding the gray areas and exploiting all available issues and subissues ("getting to maybe"). It's all about: "if this doctrine is applied, it goes this way or this way" "if the fact is found to X, it goes that way or that way; Y, it goes the other way or the other way."

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Fri Jan 21, 2011 2:41 am
by kalvano
Getting To Maybe:

Argue both sides. Or all 3 sides. Or however many sides you can find.



There. I just saved you $25.

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Fri Jan 21, 2011 2:50 am
by UnTouChablE
kalvano wrote:Getting To Maybe:

Argue both sides. Or all 3 sides. Or however many sides you can find.



There. I just saved you $25.
Yep, that is actually almost the entire book.

Someone do a summary of the policy section.

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Fri Jan 21, 2011 2:56 am
by Encyclopedia Brown
UnTouChablE wrote:Someone do a summary of the policy section.
http://www.law.duke.edu/boylesite/tort.htm

Long but worth it.

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Fri Jan 21, 2011 3:05 am
by 094320
..

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Fri Jan 21, 2011 3:10 am
by random5483
northwood wrote:what are your opinions about the book? For those in law school who have read it, is the advice good? I just orderded it from amazon and would like to see what others thought about the book.


The book is good, but I found it basically stated the obvious. Argue all sides of the case. Do not argue just one side of the case and state a conclusion. Sometimes the answer is maybe or likely or possibly, but usually you want to state what you think is more likely and why.

The book basically sums up what I said and goes into more details. Reading the book is a much better choice than doing any substantive law school preparation. However, having fun is probably the best preparation you can do for law school.

Re: Getting To Maybe

Posted: Fri Jan 21, 2011 3:28 am
by DeeCee
GTM is much better than Planet Law School II. PLSII is ridiculous.