This is a work of fiction. I have had the good fortune to work for some excellent law firms and admirable judges, and I hope that those experiences have helped me in lending realism to the imagined scenes and circumstances of this novel. With the exception of a few historical personages, however, no character in this novel is based on or intended to resemble any real person, living or dead. I have also attempted to keep the law accurate, though when it collided with the necessities of fiction, it gave way.
I am grateful to more people than I can list for their assistance in the writing, editing, and publication of this book. Tina Bennett’s representation made everything possible; her unflagging enthusiasm and critical acuity made the editing process both more pleasant and more productive. Jonathan Galassi and Annie Wedekind at Farrar, Straus and Giroux helped me to see the book my manuscript wanted to be. Eric Bardawil’s detailed analysis of an early version guided subsequent revisions. My parents, my sister, Corinne, and Larry Hardesty showed superhuman patience in reading each iteration and helping me through the problems that arose. A host of friends provided valuable comments, among them Joan Cheng, Rochelle Chodock, Ashley Evans, Eleni Gage, Jo Guldi, Rachel Hannaford, Karen Lantz, Anne Long, Jin Hee Kim, Sidney Kwiram, Jonathan Roosevelt, Danny Shivakumar, Tai Lui and Tai Ching Tan, Rebecca Tushnet, and Lara Veblen.
In developing the environments, characters, and themes of the novel, I have also benefited from a number of sources. The account of
Archie’s clerkship with Justice McReynolds relies heavily on the memoir of an actual McReynolds clerk; it was rescued from obscurity and edited by Dennis Hutchinson and David Garrow, published as The Forgotten Memoir of John Knox (University of Chicago Press, 2002). Caroline Weymar re-created for me the dating scene at Wellesley in the 1960s. Other references I found helpful include Lincoln Caplan, Skadden (FSG, 1993); Alan Dershowitz, Chutzpah (Little, Brown, 1991) and The Vanishing American Jew (Little, Brown, 1997); Judith Hope, Pinstripes and Pearls (Scribner, 2003); Duncan Kennedy, Legal Education and the Reproduction of Hierarchy (New York University Press, 1983); Anthony Kronman, The Lost Lawyer (Belknap Press, 1995); Sol Linowitz and Martin Mayer, The Betrayed Profession (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996); George Bernard Shaw, The Perfect Wagnerite (Dover, 1898); and Barry Scheck and Peter Neufeld, Actual Innocence (Signet, 2000).