From pretty much the moment that we start law school, we get advice on how to be better writers. Most of it is from lawyers (or ex-lawyers). That’s fine to start. Legal writing is a genre and has unique considerations that you have to master, if only because courts demand it, like The Bluebook.

But if you want to get even better at legal writing, remember that good prose is good prose. There’s a reason why one common piece of advice to lawyers is to stop trying to sound like a lawyer. And lawyers—even litigators—do a lot of writing that isn’t for courts. We write for our colleagues, opposing counsel and busy clients.

In those contexts, stilted legal writing is even worse. The paradoxical solution on how to improve your legal writing is to take a step back and focus on being a better writer, not merely a better legal writer.

With that in mind, here are a few of my favorite works on writing which, though not written for lawyers, most lawyers would find helpful.

1. George Orwell, Politics and the English Language

The same staleness and vagueness that bedeviled George Orwell in political writing also ruins legal writing. Orwell’s advice, particularly on word choice, remains one of the best ways to think about how to write.

2. Christopher Lasch, Plain Style: A Guide to Written English

An unforgiving, funny and well-reasoned approach to writing, with acute takes on sentence-level structure. Christopher Lasch also includes a section, “Characteristics of Bad Writing,” which on its own would make his work a good resource. That section is particularly helpful for anyone who, like me, got frustrated with the law school pedagogy where something by former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson would be put in front of you, and you’d be told to “write more like that.”

3. James Baldwin, If Black English Isn’t a Language, Then Tell Me, What Is?

I know I just made fun of the teaching style in which someone suggests that you try to copy the greats without any other direction. But if you can’t learn something from the greatest American essayist, I don’t know what to tell you. Take an especially hard look at how clearly James Baldwin frames the argument in this essay, despite the interdisciplinary breadth of his subject.

4. Virginia Woolf, A Letter to a Young Poet

Virginia Woolf has two pieces of advice that all lawyers should listen to. First, you have to write a lot, even on work that will never be published (or filed). Like any skill, you have to get reps in to get better at it. Even better: Spend some time reflecting on what you’ve written. Look back at old briefs and letters. It can be humbling, but it’s worth it. Second, “it is impossible to read too much.” If you want to be a better writer, read as much and as widely as you can. Spend the time to think about what you found effective or ineffective.

5. Stephen Jay Gould, Why No One Hits .400 Anymore

One of the key jobs you have as a legal writer is to convey complex ideas to audiences who know less about the topic than you. This essay is one of the best examples of that I’ve ever found.

6. Mignon Fogarty, Grammar Girl’s Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing

There are many books on grammar, but for lawyers with not much time and a strong urge to understand why rules exist, this is one of the best resources out there. It explains the rules, the reason and the history behind them—and when you can consider breaking them.

I’m sure I’ve left out some great works. But the point remains the same: If you want to be a better legal writer, be a better writer. Learning from writers who would never even think of using the words “pursuant” or “heretofore” not only makes you a more convincing advocate but helps you unlearn some of the bad habits lawyers have passed on to you.

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Based in San Francisco and New York, Crowell & Moring counsel Joachim B. Steinberg supports clients on commercial, technology and intellectual property litigation from coast to coast. Steinberg has experience across multiple industries, including software, aeronautics, video games and startups. He also has experience across fields of law, including trademark, copyright, trade secrets, antitrust and privacy.

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This column reflects the opinions of the author and not necessarily the views of the ABA Journal—or the American Bar Association.

“It’s never going to go well,” Arizona attorney Lynda C. Shely says about the prospect of representing anyone you are close to, including family members and friends. Shely, the immediate past chair of the ABA Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility, works in private practice and has advised more than 2,500 law firms around the country on legal ethics matters.

“What friends and family don’t understand is just giving them a little bit of advice creates an attorney-client relationship,” Shely says. “And a young lawyer can be sued if the advice they give is wrong.”

A friend or family member asking for legal advice can make for a complicated situation, especially because “young lawyers typically want to flex the knowledge they learned from law school or from their limited time as a lawyer,” says Khasim Lockhart, an associate at Frankfurt Kurnit Klein & Selz in New York, whose focus areas include legal ethics and professional responsibility.

The risks of giving legal advice in these situations

The possibility of inadvertently creating an attorney-client relationship is a very real risk.

“When you start giving advice about how to deal with somebody’s particular legal problem and not just giving referrals to sources of assistance, the risk is that you are going to inadvertently create a lawyer-client relationship—because the person is going to understand you are giving them assistance about their particular problem that they can rely on,” says Bruce A. Green, the Louis Stein chair at the Fordham University School of Law, where he directs the Louis Stein Center for Law and Ethics. Green is the current chair of the Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility.

This may violate your duty of competence if it relates to something outside your realm of expertise under Model Rule 1.1 of the ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct.

“As a young lawyer, you want to be helpful to anyone, especially family members, but at the same time, the biggest risk from helping family members is that a lawyer can end up dabbling,” Lockhart says. “What I mean by dabbling is a lawyer having limited involvement in a subject matter and giving a few pieces of advice based on general knowledge from law school or a random case they read while simultaneously trying to avoid fully engaging in the matter. But even five minutes of advice can be truly damaging.”

Ethical duties and the possibility of a malpractice claim

Shely says young lawyers should understand that even if they think they are giving just “a little bit of advice,” say on the sidelines of their kids’ soccer game to another parent, the lawyer would likely be required to put that contact in their firm’s database as a potential client and a potential conflict under Model Rule 1.18 and pursuant to their local rules that cover duties to prospective clients.

In addition to the risk of losing a friend after offering bad legal advice, a young lawyer could also be sued for malpractice.

“It happens all the time,” Shely says. “And that’s not a debt you want to take on along with student loans.” Even where your firm might have malpractice insurance, if you provide advice outside the scope of your job, it may not be covered.

How to respond when a friend or family member asks for legal advice

So what is a young lawyer who specializes in labor and employment law supposed to do when a family member comes to them with a criminal defense issue?

The best thing to do is be straightforward and say: “I have no experience in that area of law, but I can find someone for you,” Lockhart says. New lawyers and seasoned lawyers alike are familiar with other attorneys at their firms or through bar associations and can connect a family member or friend to one with the experience they need, he adds.

It’s OK to represent friends and family members, but do it the right way

If a young lawyer feels competent to represent someone close to them, there are no rules preventing that representation, but it must proceed the way that any other representation would.

“You have to do the full gamut of having them come into the office or doing a consultation virtually and sending an engagement letter,” Shely says.

She also recommends that lawyers who choose to represent a friend or family member make sure to carefully limit the scope of representation in a written engagement letter to just that matter and not agree to represent on appeal.

“Otherwise,” Shely says, “that friend or family member could mistakenly think you’re going to handle all of their legal matters for free!”

Lockhart also notes that although representing a friend or family member might feel a bit more relaxed and laid-back than a more formal representation, the ABA Model Rules still apply.

“You don’t want to assume you will be more favored by a family member or friend if something goes south,” he says.

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Editor’s Note: This column first appeared in the ABA Young Lawyers Division publication TYL on Oct. 13, 2023.

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Samuel Dangremond is an attorney admitted to the Connecticut, Florida and New York bars. He works as a trusts and estates associate at Curtis, Mallet-Prevost, Colt & Mosle in New York City.

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Mind Your Business is a series of columns written by lawyers, legal professionals and others within the legal industry. The purpose of these columns is to offer practical guidance for attorneys on how to run their practices, provide information about the latest trends in legal technology and how it can help lawyers work more efficiently, and strategies for building a thriving business.

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This column reflects the opinions of the author and not necessarily the views of the ABA Journal—or the American Bar Association.