Law Talking Guy

For whatever reason, there are certain professions that tend to query my agency a lot. Tops of the charts have got to be lawyers, with teachers a distant second. There are many strange things about this. First, most of them write picture books, when it would probably make more sense to write thrillers, mysteries or non-fiction. Stuff that makes use of their expertise and could be good PR for their day job. But they write picture books. Picture books are a lot harder to write than you would think. The monetary reward is small, and breaking into that kind of writing is even harder than adult fiction. Not only do you have to compete with Dr. Seuss who will sell more copies of Fox in Sox every single week than you'll probably ever sell anything, but the people who do get published write up a storm in order to make a living, reducing the amount of space for newcomers to near zero.

Now, my brother is a lawyer. Used to love cartooning. He probably would be a decent children's book author. And yet, he's wisely decided to stick to his 70 hour a week, 160,000 dollar a year day job. I think, knowing what I know of his line of work, from his experiences, and those of several friends of mine, that being a lawyer is a very stressful job with a lot of responsobilities and deadlines and dire repercussions. I'd imagine that writing picture books is a way for lawyers to let off some steam. Try something else. Be innocent and carefree instead of suing someone over trivial nonsense, or defending scum, or whatever else they deal with.

Which is unfortunate, because in my experience, lawyers often take law or crime into the picture books with them in the least exciting ways possible. Which is not to say I haven't seen a few decent books by attornys, but they tend to be adult books. I've seen so many books about children who want to be lawyers when they grow up it makes my head hurt. If you're going to bring law into the mix, at least try to be interesting. Here, let me show you what might be different. I can write this stuff in five minutes.

(To the tune of Cotton Fields, performed by CCR)
When I was a little bitty baby
my mama would lock me in the attic
in that old mansion on the hill

It was on the outskirts of New York City
where I wrote this very diddy
in that old mansion on the hill

When I'd act all rotten
I'd be locked in the attic and forgotten
in that old mansion on the hill

It was on the outskirts of New York City
where I wrote this very diddy
in that old mansion on the hill.


Thank you. Thank you. Next week, I'll continue the project with "I fought the School Board (and the School Board Won)" to the tune of I Fought the Law as performed by the Clash. It'll be a heartwarming epic of a young man who stands up to the the school bully with a water pistol and is thrown out of school while the bully gets off scotch free.

Or, I won't be doing that. My point is that, see? Law doesn't mix with picture books, and literally fifteen seconds of thought provided something beyond the ordinary stuff I see. Lawyers, I love ya, but you're killin' me. How 'bout some thrillers. Please?