| Read This Book! A Recommendation and Review! |
[May. 7th, 2008|10:55 am] |
Now, I'm not a lawyer. Nor do I play one on TV.
I am, however, a parent who has two daughters she loves more than life itself.
You know what? Sometimes love is not enough. We can't just hug our kids and play with them and go to the beach and read books and do all that fun stuff we love to do.
We have to work to provide. We have to house, clothe, feed, and protect our children. One sphere where we've got to do this -- and one, quite frankly, that I suck at -- is in the legal arena.
That's why when the opportunity to read a review copy of Wear Clean Underwear: A Fast, Fun, Friendly and Essential Guide to Legal Planning For Busy Parents came up, I jumped at it. This is an area I don't know much about, and I wanted to fill the gaps in my knowledge.
Author Alexis Martin Neely delivered -- and then some. She brought up questions I'd never even thought about: what happens if the people you appoint as your kids guardians die? what happens if the guardian you appoint really doesn't want to be the guardian after all? what happens if you have people fighting over your kids? what happens if your kids are left without much in the way of financial resources when you step off this mortal coil?
Neely gets you thinking, first and foremost, and that's critical. Much of what you will read here is the same advice you'll find in estate planning guides -- but rendered comprehensible, in easy to read language. I understood this book -- I didn't feel stupid or poorly educated, trying to figure out what legal terms meant. Neely asks the questions we're all terrified to ask.
There's a choose your own adventure feel to the book: If you decide to do X, go to page 55 and see what happens. I liked this. The choices presented were straightforward: you're going to do X or Y, here's the consequences of both. Are the choices exhaustive? No, but she hit the most common ones, and I'd bet they'd answer 95% of most readers questions.
Neely also wins big bonus points for being cultural aware. Frankly, a lot of guides like this (and I've read a ton of the financial ones and I ghostwrite for Long Term Care insurance professionals) ignore the fact that we don't all live in heteronormative families. We're not all Mommy, Daddy, and 2.2 kids. Sometimes there's Mommy and Mommy. Sometimes there's just Dad. Sometimes there's Mom and Dad and Stepmom and Stepdad and the girlfriend no one talks about. Neely acknowledges this, respects this, and provides at least a starting point for those of us with non-traditional families -- and the assurance that the legal system can work for us too, if we're smart and proactive about it.
Up here, to talk to a lawyer costs $100/hour, minimum. Neely's book is $17 -- and answers at least some of the questions you'll be paying a lawyer big bucks for. We all need to plan for our children. If you're clueless about this, or know a little but have more questions than knowledge, this book is a great place to get started. If you do nothing else for your kids than read this book and follow the recommendations, you'll have given your kids a greater gift than all the birthday parties in the world.
I strongly recommend it to parents like me, who know they have to do something but don't know what they have to do. I think it works best in conjunction with an attorney: this book will allow you to make efficient use of an attorney's time, which is expensive. |
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