8 Lawyers that Became Science Fiction and Fantasy Authors
Originally published at Grasping for the Wind. Please leave any comments there.
The legal profession seems to breed writers. John Grisham turned to legal thrillers, Scott Turow and Meg Gardiner the same. And who could forget the raucous and bawdy story of Tom Jones, penned (literally, it was the eighteenth century) by seated judge Henry Fielding?
Science Fiction and Fantasy have their own cast of lawyers who have turned their hand to writing. Some of these individuals are still practicing law, others have become full-time writers, but each can point to their profession as a part of their success as an author. Whether it be discipline, knowledge, or skill, each owes some debt to their argumentative and much maligned first profession.
Terry Brooks (private practice)
www.terrybrooks.net
Brooks received his undergraduate degree from Hamilton College, where he majored in English Literature, and went on to earn his graduate degree from the School of Law at Washington & Lee University.
Brooks was once asked about his legal profession in a roundabout way in a query from a fan named Johnny D. (I have left in his grammatical mistakes on the question), “i have just finished my first year studying law, should I get out now while i’m still young?”
Brooks responded:
Flee now, Johnny D, while you still can! No, maybe not. I liked practicing law. I didn’t like law school much, but I liked being a lawyer. I quit mostly because the writing was eating up all of my time, and you cannot be a master to two demanding mistresses and stay sane. Writing was my first love. It always will be. I stay interested in what I am going to write several years down the road mostly because I don’t think too much about it.
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