Top Law Schools

After reading the sticky about supplements I am thinking about these supplements to go with my casebooks please let me know what you think!

Contracts:

Contracts, Author: Farnsworth, Publisher: Aspen Law & Business, Edition: 4, Year Published: 04
Supplement - Concepts and Case Analysis - Chirelstein

Torts:

Basic Tort Law, Author: Best, Publisher: Aspen Law, Edition: 3, Year Published: 10
Supplement - The Law of Torts Examples and Explanations - Glannon

Legislation and Regulation:

Regulatory State, Author: Bressman, Publisher: Aspen Law, Year Published: 11
Supplement - Examples and Explanations: Administrative Law - Funk

Criminal Law:

Criminal Law , Author: Weaver, Publisher: West, Edition: 4, Year Published: 11
Supplement - Understanding Criminal Law - Dressler

Legal Writing - ?


Thanks in advance!

Don't buy supplements until you start classes. You have no idea if your teacher will agree with your text, and profs will often recommend supplements that will reflect their particular interpretation of the law.

beach_terror wrote:Don't buy supplements until you start classes. You have no idea if your teacher will agree with your text, and profs will often recommend supplements that will reflect their particular interpretation of the law.

Ok thanks! If they don't recommend the supplements, what should I do - stick with these?

balzern wrote:

beach_terror wrote:Don't buy supplements until you start classes. You have no idea if your teacher will agree with your text, and profs will often recommend supplements that will reflect their particular interpretation of the law.

Ok thanks! If they don't recommend the supplements, what should I do - stick with these?

For Torts you probably can't go wrong with the E&E. I'd suggest talking to 2Ls/3Ls that had your particular professors and see what they used. Also, FWIW, the Chirelstein's Ks supplement sucks. If your prof doesn't recommend something, Acing Contracts was a lifesaver for me last year.

You really can't go wrong with Examples & Explanations or Glannon.

Fro Legal Writing I would wait and see what is required for class. If
you really want something try
Better Legal Writing: 15 Topics for Advanced Legal Writers
By Wayne Schiess
but it is fairly expensive

What are your feelings on the CrunchTime series? Also, how do you figure out which supplement would go best for each class?

Wait until school starts so that you can get professor recommendations. Sure, the E&E is pretty standard and you can pick up an old edition for just a few bucks in advance. But hold off on everything else.

kaiser wrote:Wait until school starts so that you can get professor recommendations. Sure, the E&E is pretty standard and you can pick up an old edition for just a few bucks in advance. But hold off on everything else.

This, though I probably wouldn't even pick up the E&E.

Seriously, OP, chill out.

Ask your professor for recommendations once class starts. Go to the school library and look at supplements and see which ones look like they'll work for you.

Your list definitely has some of the "classics" on it, but it isn't just what works best for your professor's teaching style, it is also what is best for your learning style that matters. The commonly recommended books on here might be totally worthless if you have a professor with an unusual approach (I had one or two of those my 1L year), and certainly what works best for someone else, even someone with the same professor, might not be what is best for you.

Emma. wrote:

kaiser wrote:Wait until school starts so that you can get professor recommendations. Sure, the E&E is pretty standard and you can pick up an old edition for just a few bucks in advance. But hold off on everything else.

This, though I probably wouldn't even pick up the E&E.

Seriously, OP, chill out.

Ask your professor for recommendations once class starts. Go to the school library and look at supplements and see which ones look like they'll work for you.

Your list definitely has some of the "classics" on it, but it isn't just what works best for your professor's teaching style, it is also what is best for your learning style that matters. The commonly recommended books on here might be totally worthless if you have a professor with an unusual approach (I had one or two of those my 1L year), and certainly what works best for someone else, even someone with the same professor, might not be what is best for you.

Ok, thanks! I will just check some one once I get to school and figure out which ones work best for me.

Except for crim law, where most textbooks tend to be fairly worthless, my recommendation is to not buy a single supplement - for a month, maybe for two months - until you have a sense of whether you're the kind of person who needs them or not. Supplements have their downsides, like telling you stuff that's contrary to what you learned in class. Now, usually they won't be in enormous conflict with what you learned in class, so that's an acceptable downside if you're someone who really needs the clarity that a supplement can afford and a textbook cannot. But let's suppose you really, really get everything that's going on and the question is whether you're headed for an A or an A-. Then, you want to avoid the supplement, as it could actually cause you to get that A-, and simply use your book, your notes, and old exams. On the other hand, if you don't get a thing that's going on, you may not only want a traditional supplement - which isn't light reading - but some of the rattier emanuels, which read like Wikipedia articles on the law in book form, or even the tapes that you see some people listening to. The more basic the supplement, the greater the danger that it will lead you astray on the law (though then again, sometimes the really good supplements are the most dangerous because they cover this or that nuance that you never heard about in your professor's very summary treatment of an issue), but the more it will help you get some basic competence and understanding.