'Mesmerising and utterly absorbing' New York Times

'A magnificent storyteller' Der Spiegel

A retired small-town doctor takes a garden axe to his cruel wife.

A woman laces her brother's food with barbiturates.

Two men steal a priceless Japanese tea bowl with brutal consequences.

What drives a person to commit a crime?

Our narrator knows that behind every misdeed is a story waiting to be told. In this collection of chilling cases, a nameless lawyer recounts the love, obsession, selfishness and despair that influenced his clients' irrevocable choices.

Drawn from Ferdinand von Schirach's eminent career as a criminal defence lawyer, Crime blends fiction with real life, each story a revealing, unsettling insight into what may compel a person to act beyond the law.