Happy Hour Is for Amateurs: A Lost Decade in the World's Worst Profession

From the time I was a kid my parents said law might be a good career choice for me. I wanted to be a professional soccer player at the time, but you might as well have a backup plan. Naturally it seemed like a good choice because I loved to argue. And why not, I was good at it. It wasn't until I was a little bit older when I looked around at my friend's parents who were lawyers, former lawyers-turned-professors, and realized that not many of them enjoyed the job. And if they didn't, how would I? Happy Hour Is For Amateurs gives a great account of exactly what is wrong with the profession. Philadelphia Lawyer explains exactly the type of people that you will meet on your journey through "the world's worst profession." Billable hours, awful partners, golden handcuffs. The writer takes you on a journey with his life as the guide. Where Philadelphia Lawyer truly shines in this book though is in his absolutely astute observational ability. He picks up on societal cues, work culture, nuances, and interesting subtleties about everyday life. And when you sit down and think about it you realize how right Philadelphia Lawyer is. He sees the world with a focused lens for deconstruction and explanation. Whether the writer is talking about life in college, the terrible age of 26, or working in that career you loathe going to, his assertions are always clever and correct. An amazing gift in my opinion. Ten years is a long time in a career as soul-breaking as law, but if there is one thing Philadelphia Lawyer cemented in my mind. It is that I am truly glad I did not take the gentle advice of my parents and start a career in law. If this book is an indicator of what might happen to a person trapped, I wonder what would have happened to me?

Half-memoir, half-gonzo, Happy Hour Is For Amateurs is greater than the sum of its autobiographical parts. Ultimately, the book is a morality play; the deadly sins are sacrificing happiness for a paycheck and perpetuating the status quo in a morally bankrupt industry. Some readers may object to the author's profanity and depiction of drug and alcohol use--of course, some readers call Mark Twain "racist" and Aldous Huxley "immoral." In other words, if you have a weak constitution or delicate sensibilities, this book probably isn't for you. This book is for: (1) every worker who's ever felt like a cog or an itinerant, (2) every person who thinks, "this is as good as it gets for me," and (3) anyone who enjoys funny, insightful writing on topics most people can relate to. From the book: "There's an accidental wisdom in following. Letting something else define you narrows the decisions you have to make. It gives you parameters, a track to follow and a holiday from all the angst that comes with carving your own path." `Following' is exactly what some people need--this book is for everyone else. Happy Hour Is For Amateurs is not a book about being a lawyer, it's a book about being unsatisfied with what you do. (Though it's completely, depressingly accurate if you want to know what the actual practice of law is like for the majority of attorneys.) It's about settling and the push-pull of childhood dreams--and adult dreams--against the weight of responsibility and expectations. Philalawyer escaped, and most of us haven't, a fact sure to generate equal measures of envy and hostility. Either way, this book is compulsory reading for every disaffected office monkey, every fungible bureaucrat. The writing is always serviceable and frequently soars. Some readers may quibble with the non-linear style--but this isn't a novel, and each chapter contributes something important on the way to understanding the overall ethic of the author. The momentum slows very occasionally, but the humor underlying each vignette is more than enough to excuse the occasional digression. Lawyers, in particular, will nod their heads in agreement or sympathy throughout Philalawyer's book. Equity partners in big law firms might not get it, and associates on the same track will probably ignore it. The rest of us will say, "Thank you," and buy him a drink.

Happy Hour Is for Amateurs conveys a friend-to-friend type of honesty that is rarely exposed in the professional world, without having to buy the drinks. Blindly diving into a profession that seemed good in theory, PhilaLawyer begins to notice that a paycheck fails to rationalize the tedious and mind numbing work. To get away from a career path that repels his zest for discovery and recklessness, PhilaLawyer undergoes countless daring and exciting adventures in attempts to escape the boredom and exhaustion. Progressing towards a goal that is often uncertain, motivated by anything that drowns out the work, many life affirming lessons and self-discoveries are weaved into the page-turning stories. PhilaLawyer has a unique ability to methodically deconstruct and observe obscure situations in a way that make the book a true pleasure to read. From cover to cover the book progresses nicely and never looses its appeal. Balancing stories of debauchery and legal insight, sometimes both, the book offers a glimpse into the life of a very interesting man who is as much a lawyer as he is an inebriate and modern philosopher. PhilaLawyer understands things all too well; trapped a world where he must maintain a split personality to fuel his better half.

This was an enormously entertaining book. But before I jump into the superlatives, I think it's important to make a distinction between this book and the other bourbon-soaked tales of anal sex and professionally hazardous hangovers that this emerging genre has seen over the past few years. This book is more than the sum of its drugs, fornication and booze - it is a crushing social critique of a respected profession and of thousands of its practitioners. The author attacks the American legal system as a complicit antihero, publishing a decade worth of subversion. He portrays the frenetic courtroom, the golden shackles that bind him to his work and the familiar (for some of us) haze of substance abuse. Based on 10 years that would have driven most to a Xanax prescription, he manages to write one of the funniest books I've ever read. And that's really what matters, right? Sure, there are strokes of brilliance and the sort of introspection that makes you want to step back and re-examine your own life. But there is also a swimsuit model trying to shoot herself in the face with a taser, a hockey team locked in the back of a Uhaul with a keg and few naked lesbians thrown in for good measure. And that's what life should be about. Formulating my thoughts on this book took me a little while. This is due in part, I feel, to the author's willful disregard for the molds I like to fit books into. It's refreshing to read books like this - ones that challenge you. Fortunately, for all its complexity, it never loses itself; the tangents of the narrative never detract from the point. It is painfully funny and brutally honest; the sordid confession from a man who is not the least bit sorry. I recommend it wholeheartedly.