Changes

|title=The Collini Case

|sort=Collini Case, The

|borrow=Maybe

|isbn=9780718159191

|pages=163

|publisher=Michael Joseph

|date=September 2012

|website=http://www.schirach.de/

|summary=An immigrant who has been living a blameless life in Germany for over 35 years, suddenly shoots a man and offers no defence. His court-appointed lawyer finds an unexpected personal connection to the case. Court-room drama and/or intriguing investigation should follow. Unfortunately neither are played out to their full potential in this readable, but not totally engaging offering.

}}

''Later they would all remember it…the man was gigantic, and they all mentioned the smell of sweat''.

Caspar Leinen gets the case because he is the German equivalent of the duty solicitor. He's been qualified for 42 days. In the real world you might question what kind of defence you expect from lone representation by an unpractised legal defender. But if you're Collini, you probably wouldn't care anyway. He freely admits that he shot the man. It's going to take something special to get anything other than a straightforward Guilty verdict – and maybe a guilty verdict is what Collini wants. But why would he? More to the point why would he kill the guy in the first place? None of it makes any sense.

Then he suddenly discovers a counter-balance. He knew the victim.

In one sense that doesn't matter, because I don't believe that novels ''are'' required to have a purpose. In another, it matters immensely, because it left me uncertain as to whether I was intended to admire the lawyer or reject him, and worse yet, left me uncertain as to which I actually did.

On the upside, it is a very readable tale, with a clear-cut mystery at its heart. The mystery is well-worked. The dilemma on the part of the defending lawyer is also well-played. As a story it works, and will keep you with it.

It's just that with a slower unravelling of the historical evidence, a drip-feed of the motivations on both sides, and maybe even with a stronger motivation on the part of the prosecutors who really only get a walk-on part, the idea could have been developed into a full scale novel that might just have engaged the reader's sympathy with the characters, whichever side they eventually came down on. Rather than a vague interest in the outcome, it could have engendered an emotional reaction to the people and through that to the issues.

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