Thrillers Pave Unlikely Path to Success
For most attorneys, planning to write a best-seller and have at least the option of retiring from law practice is about as realistic as high school players’ dreams of NBA or NFL stardom.
But a fortunate few actually do achieve such goals, and among the elite cadre of lawyers whose fiction has repeatedly hit the best-seller list is David Baldacci, who reportedly initially wrote from 10 p.m. to 2 a.m. following a full day at the office. Although he went back to work in the Washington, D.C., office of Holland & Knight after his first novel, Absolute Power, sold for $2 million (not counting movie rights), Baldacci, now 47, no longer practices now that he has written more than a dozen best-sellers, reports Washingtonian magazine in a lengthy profile of his life and writing career.
His initial writing success struck not only Baldacci himself but close friends as unlikely.
“He called me and said he had big news,” recalls David Broome, a client and friend, of the time when Baldacci found out he had sold his first novel. “I thought he had made partner.”
