Crime & Law Books > T Crime & Law Books > Jonathan Herring

Advantages: Detailed, relatively easy to read for an academic textbook
Disadvantages: Expensive

This textbook is primarily aimed at students at undergraduate or postgraduate level studying criminal law. This textbook also includes extracts from journal articles and case reports, making it very thorough, as it not only tells you what the law is, but also then subjects the law to a critical analysis by including the views of various academics. This is very important for students aiming to get high marks in examinations, as some awareness of wider ...
...academic writings as part of its discussion of the law. As usual, Jonathan Herring does not take a black-letter approach to the law (see review on his book on Family Law), he incorporates deeper theoretical issues and critical analysis, which can develop your understanding. The textbook comprises of 15 chapters: 1. An Introduction to Criminal Law 2. Actus reus 3. Mens rea 4. Strict Liability 5. Homicide 6. Non fatal against the person 7. Sexual ... Read review

Advantages: keeps you in the know
Disadvantages: none

...asked me to teach her the highway code,so out came my old faithfull book that i kept,pleased that i did,only to find my daughter had brought a new updated book,i was shocked to find so much had changed .enbarrassed by this.I thought its time to learn again, my daughter and i sat down together ,every night and learned the highway code,it taught me many a thing i did not know,Also my daughter and i had fun,and quilty time together. So keep up to date ... Read review

Advantages: Well argued case, easy to read format
Disadvantages: Does not present an alternative

I think most people will recall this story which made headline news around the world. But as a quick recap, two British backpackers had bought an old VW combi van and were using it to explore Australia. One night in July 2001, they were driving the Stuart Highway through the outback when they were stopped by somebody driving another vehicle, Peter got out of the car and was never seen again. Joanne was tied up and bundled into the other van, she ...
...until she managed to flag down some help. I remember the story breaking in the UK and being filled with horror at the ordeal described by Joanne Lees. I subsequently kept up to date with the developments right through to the trial. When some opinion started to turn against Joanne, I thought it was unfair and some of it truly ridiculous. For example she was criticised for not attending press conferences and when she did for wearing a T-shirt with ... Read review

Advantages: A sober, restrained and excellently-written catalogue of murder
Disadvantages: A grim and unsettling subject

...it used to be. For the Victorian aficionado, murder, however depraved, was a human act to be savoured at arms length in front of a roaring fire while sipping a glass of Madeira (or absinthe, for those of a more bohemian persuasion). Those old-fashioned connoisseurs of crime were able to detach themselves from the swirl of emotion and anguish that inevitably clung to each case and examine methods, motives and consequences calmly and with cosy fascination. ...
...in murdering. Nowadays, however, the great beast of 24-Hour-News means that heinous acts demand our attention almost as soon as they happen, and when we direct our gaze towards them they are still cocooned inside a seething ball of emotions: the shock; the horror; the reactions from family and friends; the inevitable tearful press-conferences. We hyper-emotional moderns are more inclined to fixate on, even consume, newsworthy anguish, and to see ... Read review

Advantages: An extraordinarily well researched work of non-fiction
Disadvantages: Perhaps too much reliance on police sources

...is a horror story of the non-fiction variety.The book is a very well researched look at one of the darkest periods of Northern Ireland's troubled past and utterly fascinating in a gruesome way.There is an unfortunate tendency to glamourise the gang leader,Lenny Murphy,as a charismatic individual and an over-reliance on police sources(the police were widely criticiseed at the time of these murders for not apprehending the gang a lot more quickly:these ...
...One chilling aspect of the story is that some of the gang were never charged,although their identities remain well known locally,also there have been allegations from informers in the more recent past of rogue elements within the state security apparatus setting up victims to be hideously tortured and murdered. This book should be read by everyone with an interest in Northern Ireland.It captures the hellish milieu that was Belfast in the 70s and ... Read review