The Briefing Room: December 2025

January 5, 2026

Three Easy Ways to Upgrade Your Legal Writing This Year

Happy New Year, and welcome back to the newsletter!

We know the feeling: you start January with grand ambitions to transform your practice, but by February, the crush of deadlines pushes “self-improvement” to the bottom of the pile.

So, we thought we would point to some advice from some prominent legal writers—Bryan A. Garner, Ross Guberman, and Ryan McCarl—on three easy ways we can improve our legal writing. While they don’t agree on everything (ask them about footnotes!), they all agree on three high-impact habits that reduce the mental effort required to process your writing.

Here are three easy upgrades you can make to your next draft to write with clearer, punchier authority.

Slash the “Throat-Clearing”

Ryan McCarl argues that every document imposes a “cognitive cost” on the reader. Your job is to keep that cost low, so the judge has enough mental energy left to be persuaded by your argument.

The easiest way to lower that cost? Stop clearing your throat.

Both Garner and McCarl warn against “metadiscourse”—words that talk about the writing rather than doing the writing. Phrases like, “It is important to note that…” or, “The Court should observe that…” are empty calories. They delay the actual thought. As Garner famously preaches, if a sentence works without a phrase, cut it.

Before: It is important to note that the defendant has failed to demonstrate that there was a breach of contract.
After: The defendant has failed to prove a breach of contract.

“Explode” Your Verbs

Ross Guberman analyzes the writing of the nation’s top advocates, and he finds a consistent trend: they rely on strong, specific verbs rather than weak “to be” verbs paired with nouns (nominalizations).

Legal writers love to turn action into static things. We say we “reached an agreement” instead of “agreed.” We “make an objection” instead of “object.” McCarl calls this “condensing,” and Garner calls it the enemy of flow. Guberman encourages you to “explode” these heavy nouns back into the verbs they were born to be. This simple swap instantly makes your writing more vigorous and cuts word count.

Before: The Board made a decision to conduct an investigation into the allegation that the employee was in violation of the policy.
After: The Board decided to investigate whether the employee violated the policy.

Front-Load Your Conclusion

If you write a paragraph that saves the main point for the last sentence, you are writing a mystery novel, not a brief.

All three experts agree: you must respect the “physics of prose.” (We think the term was coined by Goege Saunders.) Readers understand information best when they know why they are reading it before they read it. Garner calls this the “Deep Issue”; McCarl calls it a “Topic Sentence.”

The rule is simple: State the conclusion first, then prove it. Never force the judge to wade through three sentences of background facts before they learn what those facts are supposed to prove.

Before: On January 5, the plaintiff sent an email. Then, on January 12, he sent a certified letter. Finally, on January 20, he visited the office in person. Because he made these three attempts, he satisfied the notice requirement.
After: The plaintiff satisfied the notice requirement by contacting the defendant three times in January. He sent an email on January 5, mailed a certified letter on January 12, and visited the office in person on January 20.

The Takeaway

You don’t need to memorize a textbook to become a better writer this year. Just look at your next email or brief and ask three questions: