Reviews

Judge Walden: call the next case

Author: Peter Murphy

Publisher: No Exit Press

ISBN: 9780857302977

Missing
Author: James Stewart
Publisher: Melrose Books (2018)
ISBN: 9781912333936

Missing, by retired judge James Stewart QC, reads like an episode of Midsomer Murders updated for the 21st century; this is no bad thing. There is a straightforward plot with the disappearance of a key character, as one might anticipate from a book with this title. It does not matter that the characters are caricatures, fleshed out with just enough detail that is required for their roles. While there is no deep analysis of personality, preconceptions or motive, this is not necessary in a short but gripping read that keeps one guessing to the very end. Further, the brief characterisation is deftly done, and conjures up possible inhabitants of a modern-day sleepy village in North Yorkshire effortlessly.

There are some fond and lyrical observations about the region, and about cricket, which appear entirely incidental to the action. While no doubt reflecting the pride and affection of the writer for his home, they were also slightly distracting. This did not stop the book from being a real page turner. Reading this at court, such is the life of a busy barrister, I groaned when it was time for the start of each day, so engrossed did I become with the narrative. The trial is covered in all the detail that only a barrister or judge would include – or want to read – and this certainly helps the tension mount. One wants to know the outcome and what the jury decides.

The ending when it came was unexpected and included the promised twist. There were lots of small questions that remained unanswered but none that troubled one unduly when justice was clearly done. More unexpected was the pondering of the justice system and the role of juries at the end of the book. It would have been better placed as a spoken observation of a character on screen (hence, a cracking modern-day version of Midsomer Murders or something longer than needs to be seen on screen); as it was it jarred slightly in a novel where what the characters think is never really explored. Nonetheless, overall, definitely worth reading.

Reviewer: Melissa Coutinho

An Illustrated History of Gray’s Inn
Authors: David Barnard and Timothy Shuttleworth
Publisher: The Honourable Society of Gray’s Inn
ISBN: 9781527219076

It is more than 70 years since Francis Cowper’s magisterial A Prospect of Gray’s Inn was published and more than 40 years since it was revised. Small wonder then that the Graya Board thought that the time had come for a fresh history which, by chronicling the Inn’s past and describing its present might assist in guaranteeing its future. Albeit it was only recently that the Inn’s traditional and exclusive role in calling its students to the Bar and conferring upon them in consequence the right to practice as barristers was enshrined in statute, they nonetheless need to be vigilant to fend off critics who question the justification for such mediaeval bodies to survive in modern times.

This handsomely produced volume takes the reader through the centuries at an educated canter. Replete with well-chosen illustrations it has the feel of a classic coffee table book, though it will no doubt be enjoyed by readers enjoying more stimulating liquid after a hard day in court or at the computer. Many of them may well be professional denizens of the Inn itself, which could not have happened before the 1970s, when for the first-time chambers were established in Gray’s outside the confines of the two Temples or Lincolns Inn. Nowadays the Inn can boast leading sets in the fields of commercial, insolvency, defamation, criminal, construction and public law, as well as human rights specialist Matrix, a creation of the new millennium.

Two of the three aptly named ‘pioneers’ whose names are specifically mentioned in this context were Richard Yorke QC and Douglas Frank QC who amalgamated two cohorts of commercial and planning lawyers into a single set at 4/5 Gray’s Inn Square through whose doors passed a diverse number of stars such as Konrad Schiemann (later a judge at the European Court of Justice), Appellate Judges such as David Keene, Alan Moses and Jeremy Sullivan and high profile advocates such as George Carman and Cherie Booth. The set also instigated associations (which continue to this day) with eminent academics such as Sir Wade and Gunter Treitel as well as with prominent lawyers from overseas jurisdictions. In the mid-nineties (when I was joint head) it was runner up three years in succession as Chambers of the Year, and under its present leadership and with scope for expansion is looking to scale the same heights a quarter of a century on.

The smallest of the Inns, Gray’s has always punched above its weight. On one glorious month in 2017 it boasted (though discreet pride is more its style) the first woman President of the Supreme Court, the Lord Chief Justice and the Master of the Rolls, and has just added the President of the Family Division to its number of high office-holders. The Inn of Bacon, Holt, Birkenhead, Atkin and Bingham fully deserves a commemorative work of this distinction.

Reviewer: Michael J Beloff QC, Treasurer of Gray’s Inn 2009