New England LawPress
Authoritative Advocacy Books for the Legal Community and Lay Public
Kendall F. Svengalis has made it his life’s mission since 1996 to provide legal information consumers, whether lawyers, law libraries, legal services organizations, or laypersons, with authoritative access to substantive information about legal publications that can serve their specific legal needs. These two books are the result of his passion.
Kendall’s Legal Information Buyer’s Guide & Reference Manual is the only book that exhaustively covered the full range of legal information sources from both a bibliographic and consumer perspective. Winner of the coveted Joseph Andrews Legal Literature Award from the American Association of Law Libraries In 1997, it is the only winner of that award to become an annual publication (1996-2021), promoting a cost-saving ethos among the law librarian community and saving law libraries millions of dollars in the process.
In 2019, Kendall published the first edition of A Layperson’s Guide to Legal Research and Self-Help Law Books, bringing that same passion to the world of legal self-help literature on behalf of those unable to secure justice due to the high cost of legal representation. The completely updated third edition of this valuable resource has been published in 2026.
Special Bonus for a Limited Time:
While inventory lasts, purchasers of A Layperson’s Guide to Legal Research and Self-Help Law Books for only $99.95 have a rare opportunity to also acquire the 25th edition of the Legal Information Buyer’s Guide & Reference Manual 2021 for the same low price of $99.95, a 54% discount from its original retail price of $215.00.
Don’t delay, act today, and add these two invaluable resources to your library collection!
Two Books, One Mission:
Educating legal information consumers and saving them time and money in the process.
A Layperson’s Guide to Legal Research and Self-Help Law Books provides a clearly written overview of the world of self-help law, a roadmap to legal research and sources of law, the legal system generally, an overview of the U.S. justice system—both civil and criminal, reviews of general works on U.S. law, and a discussion of the role of artificial intelligence in the conduct of legal research. The main body of the book provides substantive educational reviews of over 900 legal titles in 88 subject specialties, content you will find in no other legal resource. Each of these subject specialties is prefaced by an overview of the nature of the law in that field, including sources of law, essential websites, and a summary of recent developments in that field to September 2026. As an aid to consumers, each reviewed title is accompanied by current Amazon pricing. The book’s invaluable appendices include a bibliography of state legal research guides, a directory of public law libraries by state, a directory of Legal Services offices by state, and a directory of court-based self-help centers by state, followed by a directory of legal publishers. In short, this book is a comprehensive resource for every self-represented litigant or legal researcher with information you will find in no other resource.
The Legal Information Buyer’s Guide & Reference Manual is the most comprehensive guide to U.S. legal information sources in print and their costs. Written for legal professionals, it provides information on the full range of legal information sources, including reviews of over 3,000 books in 87 legal specialties, and bibliographies of major legal publications for all 50 states and the District of Columbia. Described by one law school library director as “the most useful book on legal information ever written,” it has served as the “bible” for law library reference and acquisitions librarians across the country. First published in 1996, it has now grown to over 1,200 pages in length. The appendices include a detailed annotated directory of leading legal publishers, comprehensive directories of legal publishers, a state-by-state directory of legal newspapers, spreadsheet of recent supplementation costs, cost-saving tips, and bibliography. The 2021 (25th) edition cumulates the information of all prior editions, including historical supplementation costs spanning the years 1995-2020. No other publication comes close to providing such a wealth of bibliographical information, book reviews, and cost data.