2018 End-of-Year Faculty Reading List

Faculty 2018 Holiday Reading List 16

Gregory Ablavsky, associate professor of law recommends The Republic for Which It Stands: The United States During Reconstruction and the Gilded Age, 1865-1896 by Richard White

“Yes, it’s a nearly 1,000-page tome, so probably not the best beach read. But it’s a brilliant synthesis of the many strands of the Gilded Age very deftly woven together by one of Stanford’s most distinguished historians, and so worth sticking with it. Most of the recent volumes in this Oxford History series are very good, but I found this one the best, and best-written, among them.”

 


Michael Asimow, visiting professor of law recommends Something in the Water by Catherine Steadman

Something in the Water by Catherine Steadman is a nicely executed and very clever page turner for your next long flight. It’s in the style of Gone Girl if you enjoyed that.”

 

 

 


Barbara Babcock, Judge John Crown Professor of Law, Emerita recommends Prosecuting the President: How Special Prosecutors Hold Presidents Accountable and Protect the Rule of Law by
Andrew Coan, JD ’05 and The Trial of Lizzie Borden by Cara Robertson, JD ’97

“Two books are coming out early in 2019 and I’m now reading them for possible reviews. Both are by outstanding former students.

Prosecuting the President, by Andrew Coan (Oxford, 2019), for which I blurbed: ‘Professor Coan has done the hardest thing—writing a book that will be equally interesting and informative to laypeople and lawyers alike. In this autumn of 2018, it is also exceptionally timely. It’s been years since I read a book straight through, totally caught up in the history and the analysis of the case I lived through as a lawyer in DC (Watergate) and those involving special prosecutors before and after that time.’

The Trial of Lizzie Borden, by Cara Robertson (Simon & Schuster, 2019), subtitled, “A True Story,” is fascinating social history as well as an enduring mystery. The publisher is even sponsoring a website where readers can vote their verdicts on the trial of the 19th century.”

 

 


Faculty 2018 Holiday Reading List

Nora Freeman Engstrom, professor of law and Deane F. Johnson Faculty Scholar recommends Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup by John Carreyrou

Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup by John Carreyrou. Part heart-pounding thriller, part meditation on greed and ambition, and part primer on legal muscle run amok, it’s a great read—for our time and particularly for our profession.”

 

 

 


Jeffrey L. Fisher, professor of law and co-director of the Supreme Court Litigation Clinic recommends The Fifth Risk by Michael Lewis

“Michael Lewis, The Fifth Risk. Though marketed in some circles as a swipe at the Trump administration, the core of the book contains several fascinating and accessible vignettes regarding how the executive branch is structured and the kind of day-to-day work that various agencies of the federal government actually perform.”

 

 

 


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Richard Thompson Ford (BA ’88), George E. Osborne Professor of Law recommends Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz, Class: A Guide Through the American Status System by Paul Fussell, Stylin’: African American Expressive Culture From Its Beginnings to the Zoot Suit by Graham White and Shane White, and The Suit: A Machiavellian Approach to Men’s Style by Nicholas Antongiavanni

Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz: A terrifically clever mystery within a mystery by a seasoned mystery writer, also responsible for the Midsomer Murders TV series. Any fan of the Christie style locked room caper will love it.

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“Class: A Guide Through the American Status System by Paul Fussell: An older book with a few anachronistic examples, but fundamentally as sound as the day it is was written. Fussell has a keen wit and sharp eye for bad faith and hypocrisy.

“Stylin’: African American Expressive Culture from its beginnings to the Zoot Suit by Graham White and Shane White: Loads of insight on the importance of dress to the life and liberation of African Americans, from slavery to the mid 20th century. I’d love to hear their ideas about the Black Panthers and the Sunday best activisms of the civil rights movement.

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“The Suit: Machiavellian Approach to Men’s Style by Nicholas Antongiavnanni: A clever, witty book on men’s wear written in the style of Machiavelli. What makes it more interesting is that the author is rumored to be Micheal Anton, short lived advisor to the Trump administration and author of The Flight 93 Election, written under the name Publius Decius Mus. The man seems overly fond of pseudonyms and I can’t say much in favor of his political judgment but he does know his three-roll-two from his six-two button closures.”

 

 

 


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Lawrence M. Friedman, Marion Rice Kirkwood Professor of Law recommends The Warden, The Eustace Diamonds, and The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope

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“I have to second a suggestion made by Hank Greely about the novels of Anthony Trollope. Those of you who haven’t fallen under his spell might want to start with The Warden, The Eustace Diamonds, or his darkest novel, The Way We Live Now.”


Ronald J. Gilson, Charles J. Meyers Professor of Law and Business, Emeritus recommends Who We Are and How We Got Here: Ancient DNA and the New Science of the Human Past by David Reich

“Holiday reading shares an element with beach reading: it’s a time for recreation rather than difficult books. But it also provides a chunk of time to take on tougher reads. My recommendation falls in the latter category. David Reich’s Who We are and How We Got Here: Ancient DNA and the New Science of the Human Past is an effort by the leading scholar in this rapidly advancing field, to explain both the science and the implications of being able to track the myriad of migrations in human history from the DNA of bone fragments hundreds of thousands of years old. To make the Harvard scientist’s point, which isn’t in the lengthy title, almost everything we know about our species’ ancestry before the developments of the last 5 to 10 years is at best seriously incomplete and, often, simply wrong. The book is designed for amateurs, hence the snappy title, but it is serious in describing the science and so can be heavy going at times. The hard part is necessary to frame the question the book leaves us with: the expectation that this science will in the near future show that some inter-group differences will be larger than intra-group differences. The good news is that the groups that the science reveals has very little to do with popular definitions of race. The difficult news is that as better defined, groups may turn out to have some different characteristics. Reich leaves us with a task that we may not yet be up to: how to talk intelligently and productively about those differences should his predictions about where the science will lead us turn out to be right.”


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Robert W. Gordon, professor of law recommends Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom by David W. Blight and De Gaulle by Julian Jackson

“David Blight, Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom. This has been widely reviewed and I can confirm what the reviewers say: a fine book about a stirring, majestic life.

“Julian Jackson, De Gaulle. One comes away from this book understanding why le grand Charles, endowed with a mystic sense of his mission as a man of destiny, a philosophic intelligence, and a mischievous wit, both enormously impressed and irritated everyone he came across.”

 


Henry T. Greely (BA ’74), Deane F. and Kate Edelman Johnson Professor of Law recommends She Has Her Mother’s Laugh by Carl Zimmer and Mars Trilogy (Red Mars, Green Mars, Blue Mars) by Kim Stanley Robinson

“Since last spring I’ve read two books I’d strongly recommend – a science book and a science fiction trilogy.

“The book is She Has Her Mother’s Laugh by Carl Zimmer, a great science journalist. Zimmer explores an enormous variety of facts, fancies, and issues around human inheritance. I have worked on issues around genetics for a quarter century and I still learned new things from Carl’s book … and fascinating new stories about the human settings for things I had, sort of, known, like Pearl S. Buck’s daughter and genetic disease or the real story behind the Kallikak family that provided an object lesson for early eugenicists. It’s accessible, engaging, and, from time to time, even funny. If you want to know more about genetics, this is the book for you.

Faculty 2018 Holiday Reading List 2

“The trilogy is the Mars series by Kim Stanley Robinson. Published in the mid-1990s, Red Mars, Green Mars, and Blue Mars covers nearly two hundred years of the settlement and transformation of Mars into a planet inhabited by millions of people. The (very speculative) science of terraforming is laid out in what I found fascinating detail while the geology of Mars, primeval and remade, is described in ways that make me want to visit. And our unintentional changes to Earth’s air, water, land, and ice—and possible geoengineering interventions to fix them—make the terraforming discussions surprisingly, if obliquely, relevant. Coiled around this story—and the political story of three Martian revolutions—is a multigenerational tale of interlocking families, in a scope that rivals War and Peace. I won’t claim the writing is as good as Tolstoy’s but it’s pretty good. The more than 2000 pages flew by (more or less).”

 

 


Pamela S. Karlan, Kenneth and Harle Montgomery Professor of Public Interest Law and co-director of the Supreme Court Litigation Clinic recommends Popular Crime: Reflections on the Celebration of Violence by Bill James, The Language of Food: A Linguist Reads the Menu by Dan Jurafsky, and Black Reconstruction in America, 1860-1880
by W. E. B. Du Bois

“Bill James’ Popular Crime: Reflections on the Celebration of Violence. If you like Bill James’s quirky statistical takes on baseball, you’ll find this book fascinating. He discusses the history of tabloid crimes in the United States and offers speculations about who dunnit and why we care.

“Dan Jurafksy’s The Language of Food. To quote Robert Bork (albeit in a different context), this book (by a Stanford linguistics and computer science professor) is an ‘intellectual feast.’ You’ll learn things like why the entree is in the middle of the meal, how macaroons and macaroni are related, and whence ketchup.

“W.E.B. DuBois’ Black Reconstruction in America. I re-read this for a long-term project. It will forever change how you think about Reconstruction. And passages like this one will make you think hard about present-day America as well: ‘An almost unprecedented scramble for this new power, new wealth, and new income ensued. It broke down old standards of wealth distribution, old standards of thrift and honesty. It led to the anarchy of thieves, grafters, and highwaymen. It threatened…government and morals.’”

 

 

 


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Amalia D. Kessler (MA ’96, PhD ’01), Lewis Talbot and Nadine Hearn Shelton Professor of International Legal Studies and director of the Stanford Center for Law and History recommends The Warburgs: The Twentieth-Century Odyssey of a Remarkable Jewish Family by Ron Chernow

“I’ve been reading The Warburgs by Ron Chernow (of Hamilton fame). It’s an extraordinary look at everything from the development of modern financial systems to twentieth-century fascism through the prism of one remarkable family’s biography. As we ponder parallels between today and the 1920s and 1930s, the book is an especially powerful read.”

 


Mark A. Lemley (BA ’88), William H. Neukom Professor of Law recommends The Broken Earth Trilogy: The Fifth Season, The Obelisk Gate, The Stone Sky by N. K. Jemisin

“The Broken Earth Trilogy by N. K. Jemisin. Jemisin is the only author ever to win the Hugo Award three years in a row, and for good reason. She has created a truly original science fiction universe and combined it with beautiful writing and compelling storytelling.”

 

 

 


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Michael W. McConnell, Richard and Frances Mallery Professor of Law and director of the Constitutional Law Center recommends A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles, A Place of Greater Safety by Hilary Mantel, and Tories: Fighting for the King in America’s First Civil War by Thomas B Allen

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A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles: This wonderful read chronicles the life of a Russian aristocrat under house arrest at what was once Moscow’s finest hotel and restaurant, from the 1920s until the 1950s. While whimsical and light-hearted (except for a few episodes where friends fall prey to Soviet despotism), it is ultimately a serious book about how to live a life of grace, integrity, and civility.

A Place of Greater Safety by Hilary Mantel. A fictionalized but historically accurate retelling of the French Revolution, with focus on Robespierre, Danton, and Desmoulins from childhood through the fall of Danton. We see how the hubris of revolution leads to its own self-destruction.

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Tories: Fighting for the King in America’s First Civil War by Thomas Allen. A history of the Revolution with focus on the activities of royalist opponents of independence. Not for the fainthearted. Many of us learned that a tenth of the population fled as a result of the Revolution, but I bet few of us were aware of the scale and brutality of the violence between Tories and Patriots, even within families and between friends and neighbors.”

 

 

 

 


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Lisa Larrimore Ouellette, associate professor of law and Justin M. Roach, Jr. Faculty Scholar recommends Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup by John Carreyrou and Dopesick: Dealers, Doctors, and the Drug Company that Addicted America by Beth Macy

“I have read a number of good books during my leave this quarter, but two of my favorites are tales of innovation institutions gone awry. John Carreyrou’s Bad Blood is a fascinating and cautionary tale of how Elizabeth Holmes leveraged connections, marketing skills, and aggressive legal representation to become a rising star in Silicon Valley—without any real check on whether Theranos’s technology actually worked or whether patients were being given misleading medical results. And Beth Macy’s Dopesick chronicles the progression of America’s opioid epidemic, which strikes me as a devastating failure of U.S. innovation policy—and which has inspired me to begin some research and writing on the topic.”


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A. Mitchell Polinsky, Josephine Scott Crocker Professor of Law and Economics recommends Empire Falls, Nobody’s Fool, and Everybody’s Fool by Richard Russo

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“I have become a big fan of Richard Russo’s long novels. I started with Empire Falls, which won a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and then went on to Nobody’s Fool. I’m currently near the end of the sequel to that novel, titled Everybody’s Fool. What’s remarkable about these books is that there’s very little action, yet they are highly absorbing. Russo is fantastic at depicting the foibles of ordinary people, but with great humor and humanity.”


Robert L. Rabin, A. Calder Mackay Professor of Law recommends Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover

“I would recommend Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover. The author was raised (in harrowing fashion) in a remote survivalist community in Idaho. In astonishing fashion she manages to rise above her origins to attain academic excellence at Cambridge University. A remarkable story from a number of perspectives.”

 

 

 


Deborah L. Rhode, Ernest W. McFarland Professor of Law recommends Anything Is Possible by Elizabeth Strout

“The Pulitzer Prize winning novel by Elizabeth Strout, Anything is Possible, traces the interconnected life stories of those who grew up with enormous challenges of poverty and abuse, but does so in a way that’s not simply bleak. The writing is terrific.”

 

 

 


Deborah A. Sivas, JD ’87, Luke W. Cole Professor of Environmental Law and director of the Environmental and Natural Resources Law and Policy Program and the Environmental Law Clinic recommends Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right’s Stealth Plan for America by Nancy MacLean

“As a bit of a political junkie, I have recently worked my way through a number of books trying to explain exactly how we got to where we are today in our national political discourse. My favorite so far is Democracy in Chains by Duke University professor of history and public policy Nancy MacLean. She traces the roots of our present situation back farther than most, to the strategy hatched in the immediate aftermath of Brown v. Board of Education by a cluster of academics originally centered around the University of Virginia. Her focal point is James Buchanan, who left behind a treasure trove of papers largely overlooked until now. By digging deeply into Buchanan’s writings and connecting the dots to other like-minded work going on elsewhere in the country, MacLean tells a compelling story of how my parents’ Republican party was essentially hijacked out from underneath them. A fascinating read.”


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Allen S. Weiner, JD ’89, senior lecturer in law, director of the Stanford Program in International and Comparative Law, and co-director of the Stanford Center on International Conflict and Negotiation recommends Exit West by Mohsin Hamid

“Civil war and refugee displacement meet magical realism. This is a timely novel that provides an intimate account of the struggles and choices faced by those who flee war and try to find a new home in a world that is increasingly inhospitable to refugees.”