
Published by Matador,
April 2014.
ISBN: 978-1-78306-303-1 (Paperback)
April 2014.
ISBN: 978-1-78306-303-1 (Paperback)
In this novel which is set in the 1980s or 1990s, the narrator, who bears the same name as the author, who had been a barrister (see the author’s previous novel Wig Begone), is now a Judge-Advocate presiding over courts-martial in which military personnel are tried for offences against service law which includes all criminal offences within the English legal system.
There is a jury, known as a ‘Board’,
consisting of between three and seven officers and warrant officers. The
judge-advocate decides on all matters of law, practice and procedure (like a
judge in an ordinary criminal trial); the Board decides on guilt or innocence.
Courtley finds life as a judge-advocate in Germany lonely and unsatisfying
particularly as his relations with the Army ‘top brass’ are bad all of which
affects his relationship with his wife who after a while leaves him and returns
to the United Kingdom.
Although Courtley tries criminal cases the novel is not
really a crime or mystery novel but it does present a realistic and convincing
picture of the sort of cases that come before courts-martial. In addition,
although the Army ‘top-brass’ characters are portrayed as being somewhat Dickensian,
the underlying issue - the tendency of those in high positions to think that
they are above the law - is real and important enough to warrant discussion.
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Reviewer: Radmila May

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