Law Practice,
Appellate Practice
Jan. 24, 2020
The 7 deadly sins of legal writing
Don’t let your writing be false, late, noncompliant, unsupported, unpersuasive, unfocused or boring.
Louie H. Castoria
Partner
Kaufman, Dolowich & Voluck LLP
425 California St 21st Fl
San Francisco , CA 94104
Phone: (415) 926-7601
Fax: (415) 926-7601
Email: lcastoria@kdvlaw.com
UC Berkeley Boalt Hall
Louie is a mediator with CourtCall Online Dispute Resolution, a member of the Mediation Society, a mandatory settlement officer with the San Francisco County Superior Court, and an adjunct professor of law at Golden Gate University. He won his first U.S. Supreme Court on July 1, 2021.
Writers can be their own worst enemies.
Writers of poor prose risk being derided, unpublished, and their work involuntary submitted to the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, which honors, if that is the right word, those who write "atrocious opening sentences to hypothetical bad novels." At 37 words, including a gratuitous detour into a barely relevant side topic, that last sentence may qualify for submission.
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