Opinions of study guides, "Crunchtime", "Nutshell" "Law in Flash" Car

[dft]

I know this thread is really old but I'm just buying my supplements for this semester now.  Would anyone recommending the following set of supplements, or is it too much?

E&E's for the following subjects:

     Civ. Pro
     Contracts
     Torts


Gilberts First Year Set
     Civil Procedure
     Contracts
     Criminal Law
     Property
     Torts

Can anyone critique/evaluate this set of supplements?  I feel like it may be too much (the Gilberts entire First Year Set, in particular, may not be necessary, but I figured I would save some money in buying the whole set).

[ruskiegirl]

E & E for Torts is awful!  Don't buy it. Gilbert should be sufficient for that.  If you must have some questions and answers, try your profs old exams or the CALI online lessons.


The Gilbert for K's is very good and includes everything you really need to know.  It's also quite thick.  Honestly, I doubt you will have time to use both that and E&E. 

[dft]

E & E for Torts is awful!  Don't buy it. Gilbert should be sufficient for that.  If you must have some questions and answers, try your profs old exams or the CALI online lessons.


The Gilbert for K's is very good and includes everything you really need to know.  It's also quite thick.  Honestly, I doubt you will have time to use both that and E&E. 

d**mn - I was just about to buy the Contracts and Torts E&E's on Amazon!  They've got good reviews on Amazon (though obviously not as good as Glannon's Civ Pro) and are highly recommended in PLSII - but now you've got me second guessing myself.  I already bought Glannon's Civ Pro E&E, since it seemed to be the best supplement out there (from everything I've read).

Also, I want to start prepping this summer a little bit, and I've heard that reading/skimming the E&E's is the best way to do this (just to get some kind of overview of the areas of law that I am very unfamiliar with).  Would skimming Gilberts help at all?

[dft]

The Gilbert for K's is very good and includes everything you really need to know.  It's also quite thick.  Honestly, I doubt you will have time to use both that and E&E. 

Wait a second - a few posts above, you recommended E&E's for K's!  I'm confused.  Are you recommending Gilberts or E&E's for K's?

[dft]

I tried to read E&E (Torts, Contracts, Civ Pro, Property) *before* we covered a topic in class (skipping the examples), which made the lecture and cases much more helpful, then used Gilberts and the Examples from E&E to help with outline and study for exam.

What do you think of the E&E for Property?  From everything I've read, it seems that E&E for Property is not as good as the E&E's for Civ Pro, Torts, and K's.

From what I've read, it seems like a ranking of the usefulness of the E&E's would look something like this:

1) Civ Pro (Glannon) - by far the best
2) Contracts (Blum)  - similarly ranked with   3) Torts (Glannon)
4) Property -  similarly ranked with  5) Crim Law
Con Law - not sure where this goes - probably somewhere near the bottom


Thus, my initial plan (gone awry) to purchase the top 3 (under my "ranking system," which I realize may be flawed).


Question - is it worthless to flip through the Gilbert outlines this summer before 1L to try to get an overview of the law?  I remember someone stating that it is pretty worthless because you won't understand it, whereas E&E's might be somewhat helpful at least.

Also - would anyone recommend Emanuel's or Emanuel's Crunch Time series over Gilberts?

[dft]

Just briefly - the hardest thing in property is Future Intrests, and that chapter in E&E is pretty good.  The rest...  Not so much.  E&E is a great format, but not always the best book.

Gilbert for Property is written by Dukenminier (sp?) and he is to property what Glannon is to CivPro.

Hey, thanks for all your advice.  Do you think Gilberts would be sufficient for Property then (no E&E)?

Also, would everyone recommend canned briefs (e.g. High Court Case Summaries) in addition to commercial outlines and/or primers?

Ruskiegirl - I noticed that you said somewhere that you are going to go "heavy on the supplements and light on the casebooks" or something along those lines.  Does that mean that you'll be purchasing outlines, canned briefs, AND primers for each class?

[dft]

I've revised my initial proposed set of supplements.  Here is the revised set:

Civ Pro
  Glannon E&E
  Crunch Time

Property
  Gilberts

Crim. Law
  Delaney
  Crunch Time

Contracts
  E&E
  Crunch Time

Torts
  E&E (sorry Ruskie    )
  Crunch Time

Some of the above is tentative, such as Delaney for Crim Law (recommended in PLSII) and the Crunch Time for Torts (I'm not sure if either of these are good).  And also - I'll probably get some canned briefs, like High Court Case Summaries (I'll figure this out later).

E&E's for the following subjects:

 Civ. Pro
 Contracts
 Torts


Gilberts First Year Set
 Civil Procedure
 Contracts
 Criminal Law
 Property
 Torts

[lincolnsgrandson]

Property - Gilbert's. 
Torts - Gilbert's.  some recommend E&E.  I thought the Restatement of Torts was helpful (don't buy it, of course).  Just make sure you know the elements of a negligence action from the getgo, instead of taking six months to establish them.
Contracts - Black Letter Series.  Gilbert's and Emanuel's are also fine.  I relied primarily on Calimari/Perillo's hornbook.
Crim Law - most swore by Black Letter Series.  I regretted using Understanding.
Con Law - Emanuel's.  This is probably the only class where I think a case summary book is helpful - High Court Case Summaries.  If you use E&E, you have to buy two of them. 
Civ Pro - everybody uses E&E.  I also recommend Emanuel's. 

Nutshells aren't worth buying.

You can also ask your professor what hornbooks to recommend.  They won't recommend commercial outlines and they will tell you LegalLines is the devil.  I find hornbooks often helpful.  Also, a hornbook's author might also write a commercial outline.

Make sure you get outlines from students who had the class with your professor.  The journals and other student associations keep them on file.  Get them. 

[ruskiegirl]

The Gilbert for K's is very good and includes everything you really need to know.  It's also quite thick.  Honestly, I doubt you will have time to use both that and E&E. 

Wait a second - a few posts above, you recommended E&E's for K's!  I'm confused.  Are you recommending Gilberts or E&E's for K's?

I bought both, and tried using both, but halfway through the semester figured out that using both supplements was a bit ambitious and was not the best use of my time.  Then I scrapped E & E and used Gilbert.

Basically, E&E is good for any class that is docrinally difficult.  Contracts (or Torts for that matter) isn't one of those classes.  You can get all you need to know right out of the Gilbert outline.

[ruskiegirl]

I've revised my initial proposed set of supplements.  Here is the revised set:

Civ Pro
  Glannon E&E
  Crunch Time

Property
  Gilberts

Crim. Law
  Delaney
  Crunch Time

Contracts
  E&E
  Crunch Time

Torts
  E&E (sorry Ruskie    )
  Crunch Time

Some of the above is tentative, such as Delaney for Crim Law (recommended in PLSII) and the Crunch Time for Torts (I'm not sure if either of these are good).  And also - I'll probably get some canned briefs, like High Court Case Summaries (I'll figure this out later).

E&E's for the following subjects:

 Civ. Pro
 Contracts
 Torts


Gilberts First Year Set
 Civil Procedure
 Contracts
 Criminal Law
 Property
 Torts

Serisously, you are wasting your money on the Torts E&E.  It's very incomplete. 

Quite honestly, I think all of you pre-1L's are jumping the gun buying supplements this early.  I remember being you, being so eager to start I was ready to start plowing my way through casebooks by mid-June if I knew which ones to get.  Just like you guys, I loaded up on the supplements before starting school.  I read them a bit before classes started, but by the end of the semester I completely regretted the financial waste.  Some of the supplements lay untouched on my shelves -- they weren't very good for that particular subject.  I had to get other supplements to replace the wrong ones I had purchased.  Other supplements I found din't work for my learning style.  I will be passing them down to my unsuspecting friend who starts at Boalt this fall. 

It's very worthwhile to wait a couple of weeks, feel out the class, reidentify your learning style, and see if your professor suggests any supplements.  I don't think anyone who waits a week or two into classes to buy supplements in any way jeapordizes his chances of getting an A.