In this issue's "Where There's a Will" column, Eddy Smith looks back at his nearly 30 years of practice as a trusts and estates attorney to share some of the common mistakes he's seen and a better approach for each.

Tennessee Bar Association members who have died recently are memorialized.

Nashville lawyers Erik Halvorson and J. Hunter Robinson, both with Bradley, will receive the TBA's prestigious Justice Joseph W. Henry Award for Outstanding Legal Writing on June 12 during the association's Annual Convention in Knoxville. The award, which will be presented at the Lawyers Luncheon, was established more than 40 years ago and is given each year to the lawyer who writes the most outstanding article published in the Tennessee Bar Journal for the preceding year. Halvorson and Robinson are being honored for their article One Domino Falls: Tennessee Supreme Court Reshapes Foreclosure Claims, which appeared in the March/April 2025 issue of the Journal.

In announcing the selection of Halvorson and Robinson, TBA President Heidi Barcus. said, “This winning article took a complex ruling from the Tennessee Supreme Court and, in straightforward and concise language, explained the consequences for both mortgage-related and non-mortgage-related litigation in Tennessee. This is the kind of writing the Joe Henry Award was created to recognize.” The award is named for Joseph W. Henry, a former chief justice of the Tennessee Supreme Court, who was known for his forthright and clear writing. Read more in a press release from the TBA.

Belmont University College of Law recently announced that 2L Ryesa McGehee is this year’s winner in the law school's seventh annual Legal Fiction Workshop. “Routine and Habit” is a gritty story about one defense attorney’s willingness to follow her intuition wherever it may lead. McGehee's story is also eligible for the American Bar Association (ABA) Ross Essay Contest for Legal Short Fiction, which will be decided later this summer. The story was chosen by community reader Frank Toub, who said, "The author tells the all too familiar story of an attorney who, in going the extra mile for a client, oversteps to her own detriment." While a student at Belmont Law, Toub participated in the 2022 Legal Fiction Workshop and won the ABA's Ross Essay Contest.