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In the Shadow of the Law

by Kermit Roosevelt



      In the Shadow of the Law is the coming of age story for the law firm of Morgan Siler. Chief among the themes studied is how everything and everybody related to the firm has changed in the past seventy years in order for it to remain successful in business, such as: the ideal of the gentleman and suitable professions, the role of the business law firm, the strategic use of litigation as a tool instead of as a last resort, and burden of honor and justice replacing their necessity.

There are a lot of unhappy people at Morgan Siler. There are people drowning in paperwork and billable hours, who were idealistic in school, but have lost their illusions concerning the nobility and satisfaction of practicing law. There are people who are successful and bored or alone. Listening to their thoughts and discussions provided me a perspective concerning legal issues I didn't know existed, such as defending a person's rights vs. defending a person, and the fact that the guilty do not have a right to counsel.

This is not a simple book to read. The language is advanced and I looked up a lot of the legal jargon, e.g., tort, deponents, arbitrageur, interrogatories, habeas petition, cert petition; as well as common words that have a specific meaning in a legal context, e.g., opinion, relevant, privileged.

The disparity between the perpetual motion of the corporation and the stagnation of the firm members is emphasized by cleverly introducing too many characters to remember clearly. Every person may not seem to be important to the story, but each one is connected to the Law and the wave that is Morgan Siler. A character may be swept along in the current for years as a partner or tossed up on the beach by the casual thought of a first-year associate as his next thought breaks upon the shoreline of the justice system. As long as there is an ocean, there will be waves; as long as there is the Law, there will be Morgan Silers; and as long as there are idealists, there will be first-year associates for them to drown.

The Book

Farrar, Straus and Giroux
June 15, 2005
Hardback
0374261873
Fiction/Contemporary
More at Amazon.com
Excerpt
NOTE: profanity

The Reviewer

Beth E. McKenzie
Reviewed 2005
NOTE:
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