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Summary
Summary
The internationally bestselling courtroom drama centering on a young German lawyer and a case involving World War II
A bestseller in Germany since its 2011 release--with rights sold in seventeen countries-- The Collini Case combines the classic courtroom procedural with modern European history in a legal thriller worthy of John Grisham and Scott Turow.
Fabrizio Collini is recently retired. He's a quiet, unassuming man with no indications that he's capable of hurting anyone. And yet he brutally murders a prominent industrialist in one of Berlin's most exclusive hotels.
Collini ends up in the charge of Caspar Leinen, a rookie defense lawyer eager to launch his career with a not-guilty verdict. Complications soon arise when Collini admits to the murder but refuses to give his motive, much less speak to anyone. As Leinen searches for clues he discovers a personal connection to the victim and unearths a terrible truth at the heart of Germany's legal system that stretches back to World War II. But how much is he willing to sacrifice to expose the truth?
Author Notes
Ferdinand Von Schirach is one of Germany's most prominent defense lawyers and a prolific author. His short story collections, Crime and Guilt , were instant bestsellers in Germany and have been translated in more than thirty territories. He lives in Berlin.
Reviews (4)
Publisher's Weekly Review
Von Schirach, a prominent German advocate for the accused and author of two story collections (Guilt; Crime), disappoints with this present-day legal thriller, a "whydunit." Fabrizio Collini, a toolmaker in his late 70s, pretends to be a reporter for an Italian newspaper when he calls on 85-year-old Jean-Baptiste Meyer, a German businessman, in his room at Berlin's Hotel Adlon. Collini later confesses to shooting Meyer four times in the head, and then stamping repeatedly on Meyer's face. Caspar Leinen, who has just begun work as a defense lawyer, accepts the case before realizing that Meyer's real name is Hans Meyer, and that he's an old friend; but Collini wants Leinen to stay on the case, despite this personal connection. Given the advanced ages of the two principals, readers will have no trouble guessing that the killer's motive has something to do with WWII. Even the courtroom scenes lack genuine drama. (Aug.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Guardian Review
This lean thriller about the difference between moral and legal reparation for wartime atrocities caused a storm in Germany and appears here in a typically sensitive translation by Anthea Bell. She preserves lawyer von Schirach's distanced, clinical tone as well as the musculature of the simple plot, which exists mainly to frame the courtroom debate that comprises the book's second half. The protagonist is clever young attorney Caspar Leinen, forced to represent an apparently sane, respectable Italian man who admits to the vicious killing of an elderly German industrialist but refuses to say why he did it. The complication is that Leinen knew the murdered man well and is in love with his daughter. Once you overlook the implausibility of the set-up, this is a small gem - sly, trenchant and provocative, none of its conclusions foregone. - John O'Connell This lean thriller about the difference between moral and legal reparation for wartime atrocities caused a storm in Germany and appears here in a typically sensitive translation by Anthea Bell. - John O'Connell.
Kirkus Review
Because the murderer makes no attempt to hide his crime, the mystery is the motive in this concise legal thriller. Caspar Leinen is a new lawyer; smart, hardworking, burdened with a sense of justice, even righteousness, but not fool enough to think this will excuse him from having to make a living. His first case is a sensational murder. Fabrizio Collini has killed a man: He admits as much, and the evidence is all over him. When Leinen learns he has a personal connection to the victim, he attempts to back out, but an older colleague, the famous Richard Mattinger, dissuades him. Mattinger is the victim's lawyer, the auxiliary counsel for the prosecution. It is not necessarily a matter of virtue that persuades Leinen to stay on the case. We know what will happen--the question is how: Evil is in the devil, the devil in the details. The pleasures of the book are its particulars: of the law and how it is practiced in Germany, the anecdotes that give agency and motive to the characters, fascinating tidbits about detonators, the description of an autopsy. This is the stock and trade of crime fiction. All the conventions--even a love interest--are present; a regular reader will check boxes off a list, and yet this book works magic. Von Schirach, prominent defense attorney in Germany, author of two highly regarded short story collections (Guilt, 2012, etc.), is renowned for his tone, the evenness with which he treats his facts, the unforced suspense that unnerves his readers. It is the care von Schirach takes with history, with the return of the repressed, that makes this short book remarkable.]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
This spare novel follows the publication of the English translation of von Schirach's debut short-story collection, Crime and Guilt (2011). The author's unique perspective and experiences as a defense attorney gave credibility to that collection, as it does to this novel. An Italian living in contemporary Berlin enters a hotel suite and brutally murders its occupant. Then he waits in the lobby to be arrested. All that is known of the killer is that he is a retired machinist at Mercedes-Benz. The victim is one of the richest men in Germany. The focus is on court-appointed defense attorney Caspar Leinen, who has been qualified for only 42 days. This is a pretty typical David-and-Goliath legal case, with Leinen pitted against one of Germany's top prosecutors. But the way that Leinen digs for facts and his eventual discoveries, which go back through his personal past and extend to the Holocaust animate what is a tight-lipped but involving mystery.--Fletcher, Connie Copyright 2010 Booklist
