First, I thank my readers. I hope the book has been worth your time.
I owe many other people my gratitude. It’s strange that a ream of paper can generate so many debts, but it does, and I offer acknowledgments in roughly chronological order.
My parents are, as the law would put it, the “but for” cause of this book (but cannot be blamed for it). They’re wonderful people. I’m lucky to have them as parents and for their support of my decision to leave law not long after their last tuition subsidy had been cashed. Then again, my parents probably saw the writing on the wall after a certain law professor tried to have me expelled for impertinence. (This may explain why few thanks are extended in that direction, although Professors Bainbridge and Volokh showed me how interesting law could be.)
My agent, Paul Lucas, has been a tremendous friend and guide, a zealous advocate and a close reader. He and the Janklow & Nesbit team have my thanks. They also have my trust, and for authors, who can say fairer than that?
The entire team at Hachette Book Group has been wonderfully supportive. My editor, Paul Whitlatch, is kind and gracious, equipped with a keen eye. He’s faithful to the text, mindful of the reader, a pleasure to work with, and I rarely find myself in anything but accord with his suggestions. Few writers have the good fortune to say the same. The same can be said of his editorial colleagues, Lauren Hummel and Mollie Weisenfeld. Thanks also to publisher Mauro DiPreta for being a fierce advocate for serious books. As usual, Hachette’s production team deserves credit for assembling a large book cleanly and confidently—thank you, Mike Olivo and Mandy Kain. Copy editors are not, I think, well-represented in acknowledgments, but they should be, especially when dealing with a book on law, a subject whose first language is not English. Marina Lowry has my gratitude. Thanks also to Hachette’s marvelous in-house publicity and marketing team, including Michelle Aielli, Michael Barrs, Odette Fleming, Mark Harrington, Anna Hall, and Joanna Pinsker.
My special gratitude goes to my research assistants, April Reino and Wendy Lim, who have been everything an author could hope for: diligent, exhaustive, and committed to the facts. Their ability to find data based on my hazy recollections (“it’s in the BLS database, as series 203483 or something or other”) was astounding. This is my second book with them, and as they move on to new projects, I wish them the greatest success.
Angela Baggetta, my publicist, did a wonderful job with my previous book and I’m delighted to work with her again. Angela is factual, tireless, responsible, and effective. It’s harder than ever to get books noticed, but she does, to her great credit.
My partner has been supportive beyond all reasonable expectation. While we disagree about some issues (and sometimes disagree significantly about how best to express a thesis), of the minds I’ve known well, my partner’s is the most generous and agile.
Once again, I find myself thanking Luis Mendez and Dr. Clifford Sewell for providing me with the home and the health to do another book. Thanks also to Dan Halpern, a fine friend and great man, to whose many and deserved honors I add my own tribute, small in comparison, but deeply felt. My friends Betty and Alex Wilcox also deserve thanks, for reasons too strange to commit to the page. And to Michael, Troy, and the rest of Le Coucou, thank you. What can I say? My work is hardly perfect, but yours is, even if a certain one of its manifestations has disappeared from your menu.
As for the legal system, my experiences are obviously not unmixed, but there are some fine professors, judges, and advocates, and I’ve relied on their work in many places. What hope there is for the law rests in the fact that such people do so much and so well that they almost compensate for the rest of the legal universe.
And of course, there’s my Fuzbo and my beloved Animal Family. Vacaciones are coming, little ones.