Julie Compton: Lawyer to Author

Author of legal thriller “Tell No Lies”, Julie Compton, talks to Law and More about leaving her legal career behind…..

Julie on the law….

"I chose to go to law school because I've always loved arguing with people. I'm very opinionated and I'm not shy about expressing those opinions, especially on paper (though I think I've mellowed as I've grown older!). I have also always enjoyed the idea of championing the rights of others who aren't able to speak for themselves. Even as a child, I remember sometimes sticking up for or wanting to befriend the kid that everyone else was making fun of.

"When I graduated from law school, I went to work for a mid-size private firm in St. Louis. I started out in litigation but then found myself drawn to bankruptcy. Ironically, I was able to get into the courtroom more often as a bankruptcy lawyer than as a litigator. Also, bankruptcy law made more sense to me. There seemed to be less "grey" areas in both the statutes and the cases. It was a smaller bar, too, so the attorneys tended to be more civil with one another.

"After a few years I joined a larger, national firm that was opening a new office in St. Louis, but a few years later, when my boss from the first firm struck out on his own, I left the second firm to join him. I remained with him until after I had my second daughter and decided to stay home. By the time I returned to law six years later, I was living in the suburbs of Philadelphia, and I accepted a job with the U.S. Trustee's Office, part of the U.S. Department of Justice.  

"I have two main career highs. The first was my very first trial, when I was appointed by the court to represent – on a pro bono basis – an inmate on a prisoner abuse case. Although many of these cases can be frivolous, I was convinced that my client really had suffered some physical abuse in prison (though minor) and I was determined to convince the jury, too. I thought perhaps I'd been successful when the jury took a long time to decide the case; usually in these types of cases, they come back within an hour with a verdict against the inmate. I can't remember for certain, but I think the defendants even offered my client a small sum to settle, because they were starting to think we'd won, too, but he refused. He truly seemed more interested in the verdict than the money. Ultimately, the jury ruled against him, but along with their verdict, they sent a note out to the court and asked that it be read in the courtroom. The gist of the note was that they believed the abuse had occurred, but that because my client had virtually no damages, they ruled against him. Believe it or not, my client was extremely pleased with this outcome. He felt vindicated. 

"The other high was my job with the Department of Justice. I worked in Wilmington, Delaware, which is where some of the largest corporate bankruptcies were being filed at the time. It was a very exciting, fun practice, both from a legal standpoint and because the Wilmington bankruptcy bar was made up of many great people. I think I'd still be there if our family hadn't moved to Florida."

Leaving the law……

"The practice of law can be quite grueling, as I'm sure your readers know, especially when you're trying to raise a family: I hated the long hours. The first time I left the practice of law was to stay home with my kids. I wasn't even thinking about writing. I had tried the part-time route with my first daughter, and I simply felt I wasn't doing either job well – practicing law or raising my girls. I know many attorneys manage it just fine, but it was hard for me.

"Once I'd been home a few months, I realized it would be a good time to begin writing creatively again. (I'd given it up once I'd entered law school; I just didn't have the energy after a long day of classes and studying cases.) I was home for six years before returning to practice, and it was during the last 2-1/2 to 3 years of that period that I wrote the first draft of what is now Tell No Lies. The novel was done, but not yet edited, when I returned to practice with the Department of Justice. I decided to stop practicing a second time when we moved to Florida for my husband's job, and this time it was a writing-related decision. The job with the DOJ had been a dream job for me – one I knew I couldn't duplicate in Orlando – and I missed the long days of writing.

"There are simply too many things I want to do in life, and practicing law was not conducive to exploring them all.

"Of course, there are aspects of the practice that I miss, like the camaraderie between lawyers. There are certain conversations that a lawyer can only have with another lawyer; we can spend hours talking about the interpretation of a case or analyzing something a judge said during a hearing. I can't do that with my "lay" friends or I'd bore them to death. But I stay in touch with many of my old colleagues to get my fix. I also volunteer as a guardian ad litem in child abuse and neglect cases. Though I don't act as an attorney in these cases, it keeps me in the courtroom.

"But I don't miss the long hours, and I don't miss the petty things lawyers often end up fighting about before they get to the real issues. I pop out of bed in the morning now because I can't wait to get in front of my computer to start the day's writing. Writing for me is pure joy."

On writing….

"I've written for as long as I can remember. I've always loved writing, in one form or another, but it never seemed like a viable career option, financially speaking. Once my husband and I were more established in our careers, we were fortunate enough that I could stay home with our children and have the time to pursue writing.

"As a kid, I remember reading books (recommended to me by my father) like The Princess Bride, Watership Down, Addie Pray (which most people know, because of the movie, as Paper Moon), and most of the early Judy Blume books. I also read every book in both the Nancy Drew and the Little House on the Prairie series at least two or three times.

"As an adult, my reading tastes are extremely varied, I think. As a lawyer, of course I've read my share of legal thrillers and suspense novels by Scott Turow, John Grisham and others, but I never considered my novel to fit into the genre until my publisher told me it did! But a few writers who really impress me, both as a reader and a writer, are Don DeLillo, Paulo Coelho, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and Michael Cunningham. I read them and just shake my head because their talent is just so amazing to me. I also read a lot of what I call "relationship" books, like those written by authors such as Sue Miller, Jodi Picoult, Anne Tyler, Chris Bohjalian, Ian McKewan, Amy Bloom, to name just a few, and I think these are the writers who most directly influence my writing.  

"In Tell No Lies there's only one character that comes straight from someone I know, and he's a very, very minor character. He's really there as an inside joke. As for other characters, they all have personality traits that I've seen in exhibited attorneys I've worked with, for better or worse, but they're all fictional. The seed for a few characters might have originated from real people (one that immediately comes to mind is Jenny's nemesis, Maxine Shepard), but once I began to write, they took on a life of their own. Indeed, that's the hardest part about finishing a novel. You spend so much time with your characters, and then it feels like you're saying goodbye to them for good.

"Having said that, I think certain details from my practice of law (as opposed to the people) found their way into the story. For example, there's mention of Jack touring the remains of an exploded farmhouse early in his career. I actually did that, and what I saw found its way into my writing. One of the earliest drafts of the novel had quite a lengthy description of the house. I edited most of it out at some point, though, long before the publisher ever saw the manuscript. Even though I liked what I had written, it was irrelevant to the plot."

On the next novel….

"As for the next novel, it has another male protagonist, and there's plenty of suspense (I hope!), but he's not a lawyer and the novel is not a legal thriller. It's set primarily in Florida, although part of the story takes place in New England and Africa, also. It's basically a story about a guy who, as he's trying to literally save the life of the woman he loves, ends up figuratively saving his own, too. 

"Right now I'm working on finishing this next novel, and I've already written the synopsis and a few pages of novel number three. I'm just hoping that I have enough success to keep writing full-time."

Good luck Julie.

Read more about Tell No Lies here