Leslie Book, J.D., LL.M.

Professor Leslie Book is a Professor of Law at the Villanova Charles Widger School of Law. While at Villanova Professor Book served as Director of the Federal Tax Clinic, Director of the Graduate Tax Program, and Director of the Online Graduate Tax Program. Prior to coming to Villanova, Professor Book was an Assistant Clinical Professor and Director of the Low-Income Tax Clinic at Quinnipiac University School of Law in Hamden, Connecticut. Before joining the academy, Leslie Book was associated with Davis Polk and Wardwell and Baker & McKenzie in New York and in London. He also served as a Professor in Residence with the IRS, Taxpayer Advocate Service in 2019.

Professor Book is a national authority on tax procedure, tax administration and issues affecting the low income taxpayer community. He is the cofounder and one of the primary bloggers at Procedurally Taxing. He is the successor author for the Thomson Reuters treatise IRS Practice and Procedure. Book has testified before Congress on the fair administration of our nation’s tax laws and on the future of tax administration. In 2007 he won the ABA Tax Section Janet Spragens Pro Bono Award winner, and in 2018 he was the inaugural winner of the Diane Ambler Award for faculty curricular innovation for his work in creating the Villanova Online Graduate Tax Program with his colleague Joy Mullane. A fellow of the American College of Tax Counsel, Leslie Book has authored numerous law review articles and is the primary author of three research reports submitted to Congress on behalf of the Taxpayer Advocate Service, including a 2019 report containing a series of proposals to improve the administration and delivery of refundable credits.

Professor Book received his B.A. from Franklin & Marshall College (magna cum laude), his J.D. from Stanford University School of Law, and his LL.M (Taxation) from New York University School of Law. At Stanford Law School, he was a founding editor of the Stanford Law & Policy Review, and at New York University School of Law he was a student-editor at the Tax Law Review.