No Bail for the Judge

Colonel Brain #1

by Henry Cecil

A dour and highly-respected High Court Judge finds himself on trial for the murder of a prostitute. He has no recollection of the events leading up to the murder so believes he may be guilty. His daughter, however, is convinced of his innocence, so she enlists the help of a petty thief to help solve the complex mystery.

Genres: Humor

202 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1952

About the author

Henry Cecil Leon (19 September 1902 – 23 May 1976), who wrote under the pen-names Henry Cecil and Clifford Maxwell, was a judge and a writer of fiction about the British legal system. He was born near London in 1902 and was called to the Bar in 1923. Later in 1949 he was appointed a County Court Judge, a position he held until 1967. He used these experiences as inspiration for his work. His books are works of great comic genius with unpredictable twists of plot, but are not intended to be realistic or strong on characterization. They typically feature educated and genteel fraudsters and blackmailers who lay ludicrously ingenious plots exploiting loopholes in the legal system. There are several recurring characters, such as the drunken solicitor Mr Tewkesbury and the convoluted and exasperating witness Colonel Brain. He writes well about the judicial process, usually through the eyes of a young barrister but sometimes from the viewpoint of the judge; Daughters in Law contains a memorable snub from a County Court judge to a barrister who is trying to patronise him.

His 1955 novel Brothers in Law was made into a film in 1957 and, later, a television and radio series starring Richard Briers. While at Paramount Pictures, Alfred Hitchcock worked on adapting No Bail for the Judge for the screen several times between 1954 and 1960, and hoped to co-star Audrey Hepburn, Laurence Harvey, and John Williams, but the film was never produced.

Reviews

[Stephen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Who better to write a murder mystery in which a judge is the accused than an actual English judge of long service? Henry Cecil was the nom de plume of Judge Henry Cecil Leon, an English lawyer who sat on the bench from 1949 until 1967. He wrote 26 novels, all of them drawing on his experience as a jurist. It is unclear whether they are intentionally humourous or coincidentally humourous due to the author's keen wit. The best scenes are those set in the courtroom at the Old Bailey where Mister Justice Prout is put on trial before his own Chief Justice. The plot is clever. The characters believable. The outcome satisfactory. How much can one ask?

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this in March of 2006
I enjoyed it very much.
Each chapter has a new main character, each one fitting into the larger story.
He writes with subtle humor, he isn’t so much telling jokes as dead pan descriptions of situations that ware funny as you think about them.
Like Raymond Chanlder, but in a lighter way, you learn more about the characters by what they say than what the author says about them.

[Burnard Morey · Rating 4 out of 5]

I bought this book second-hand 50 years ago. I was going to bin it prior to moving house but decided instead to cut the spine off and scan it to a PDF. I recently converted it to Kindle format and re-read it.

It's short and fairly light-weight but made interesting because the author is a judge himself. The police work is rudimentary by today's standards.

I wouldn't buy a new edition (if it is still in print) but if you come across a copy in a thrift shop or second-hand book store it's working buying as long as it's no more than, say, $5.00. It's also available on Overdrive as an epub (via your local library system).

[Suryamouli Datta · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read Henry Cecil for the first time. Looking forward to more of his books. The wit and humor was awesome !

[Emma · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pretty hilarious account of the misdoings of criminals, and how a judge loses his memory and gets accused of murder because of it.

Henry Cecil is always a good writer.

[Will · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not one of the justice's stellar works, but offers lots of captivating Cecil court scenes. Apparently the introduction of "the boss" Ambrose Low, and featuring from Cecil's "repertory company" the unmanageable Colonel Brain (and perhaps the Painswick Line).

[Vinay Kumar · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very good book. Entertaining. This is my second book by Henry.

[evelyn! · Rating 4 out of 5]

first roe v. wade and then depp v. heard and now this???