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This book (called "Chirelstein" at my law school) is absolutely necessary to anyone learning Federal Income Taxation. It will teach you all the basic concepts you are supposed to be learning from all the cases and formulas in your textbook and Code in PLAIN ENGLISH with helpful examples. If you read the applicable sections of this book before reading your assignment, you will always have the answer when called on in class and (I haven't had my final yet) but I suspect it will help you understand more for the all-important final.
Like most law school subjects, it's easy to lose the forest for the trees, and starting off with this book will let you understand how things fit together before you start slogging through- and get lost in- the Code. I strongly, strongly recommend this book for any law student taking an income tax course who has no experience in accounting. I read this book in the beginning of the class- it's relatively short and incredibly readable- and it made the actual class a breeze. As a corollary to that, this book is basically useless as an exam prep; it's too much of a general survey of the topic, and if you're using this to prep for your final you are in deep trouble. However, if you just signed up for tax in the winter term, buy this book and read it over break- it'll take you a day or two, and you'll be glad you did.
If you get a kick out of the legal writers who make no attempt to hide their arrogance (Scalia comes to mind), then you will enjoy reading Professor Marv. You get the feeling that he often wonders to himself what it's like to be stupid.Even if you don't take to his "burdened genius" persona, it won't prevent you from seeing new ways of looking at concepts in addition what your casebook provides. He wrote this as a "universal supplement," and has taken care to avoid a retread of any of the major texts.Unlike previous editions, according to the author, this one has a Q & A section at the end of every chapter. They're useful exercises, especially since they have answers and explanations, unlike most casebooks.
and "Loose ends," in which he ties up a particular chapter or subchapter with some point of clarification that makes so much sense you're just sure your professor is going to have something about it on the exam. It's a clear, succinct, helpful, and occasionally witty introduction to the law of federal income taxation. This book comes as advertised. Which also bears a point of warning: law professors read it too. Chirelstein has a rare talent for making the sometime inscrutable rules of tax law accessible to even the most tax-phobic law student. Particularly useful are his examples (even his charts and numbers are easy and helpful). Beware of using it as your principal text, as, thorough as it is, the book does not cover all the cases and doctrines of tax law. I know firsthand that clever professors can and do write Chirelstein-proof exams.
This book is a useful introduction to some of the principal concepts of the U.S. tax law. I recommend it to law students, young tax lawyers and other professionals that need to develop a good foundation of basic tax law concepts. The framework this title will help you develop will be of great assistance in learning how to think about tax issues and understanding more specialized areas of the law.
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