Criminal Law: Text, Cases and Materials (Text Cases & Materials)

After having a bit of a battle with the recommended textbooks for Criminal Law when I studied it last year, I started looking around. I had used the Torts book in the same series which was fantastic so thought I'd give Herring's book a shot.

All I can say is don't let the compact size put you off. Herring has succeeded in covering an impressive amount of material, doesn't skimp on the detail and still includes academic commentary, though a nice proportionate amount. Herring has a very accessible style of writing and simply uses plain english, which is well needed for some of the more complex topics.

The layout of a textbook makes a huge difference and this book is ideal with clear paragraph divisions and sub-headings. I was also very impressed with the case notes sections at the end of each chapter, which really obviate the need to buy a casebook as well as a textbook.

I really enjoyed Criminal Law, but used to dread my original textbook which was far too dry, wordy and contained too many of the author's own thoughts - not very helpful when you're preparing for tutorials and probably even worse when revising!

Luckily this book saved my life! I would say it is a very good introduction to the subject, excellent for quick reference and quite honestly more than sufficient to do well in exams.

Best first year book (1/1 people found this helpful)

This was the only book that I had to read in my first year that I actually liked. It was clear and written in a kind of friendly way so that you felt like the writer was trying to explain things rather than prove how clever he was to understand such complicated things. I found the two section approach useful becuase I could start with the basics and stick with that side if I needed to like with intoxication or go over to the hard side with easier topics or so that i could write an essay. It is pretty mcuh like two books in one which is great bacuse it saves money too. The best thing is that it makes the topics interesting. My gran read the chapter on murder although I don't really know why and even she said it was great and kept telling me things that she knew. She said that she'd recommend it to anyone who wanted to write a detetctive story becuase they often get things about the law wrong and it really annoys her. I'd recoommend it to anyone studying criminal law.

Good but not the best (2/2 people found this helpful)

I recommended this text but then felt the need to warn students about some of the dangers of using it. There are quite a lot of errors and there is little original material or analysis. The author has produced a clear account of the law, but he is not renowned for criminal law scholarship, and the book lacks the insights that come from a text written by a criminal law expert. I prefer the editions of Card Cross and Jones, and, for the better students, Smith and Hogan is still my ideal.

Basic Textbook Reading (1/1 people found this helpful)

'Criminal Law' by Herring is one of the clearest, tidiest and most student-friendly law textbook I have ever read. From the law-summary at the start of each chapter, to the handy bullet points, examples and exam-tips it is an absolute treasure for students. The use of colours also sets it apart from its fellow, drab, criminal law textbooks (nobody wants to read 40 pages of tiny letters on brown-grey paper).

I have recommended this book to every fellow student who was having problems understanding the intricacies of criminal law. It's clear writing-style and useful question-solving diagrams will thus be a lifesaver when it comes to answering problem questions.

Essay questions, on the other hand, will not be so easy. This book uses a mechanism that splits every topic into 'the law' and 'the theory', the law setting out how it all works, the theory explaining how it came about and what the problems are. Sadly, the theory part is not as clearly written as the law part. Usually the author has extracted parts of essays and papers on the subject, but these essays are not always as clearly written (at least, not from a students' point of view). I often found myself using Herring's 'criminal law' textbook to get an understanding of the law and to be able to solve problem questions, and combining two other textbooks to gain an understanding of the theory - in order to answer essay questions.

As criminal law is usually more focused on problem questions, students will usually be able to solve the essay questions on exams by using their knowledge of the law. A deeper understanding of the ideological undercurrents of criminal law is thus not strictly necessary (though it is always advisable to grasp the basics, if only to better understand why some judges decide the way they do).

Criminal Law: Text, Cases and Materials (Text Cases & Materials)

Jonathan Herring

Reader Reviews:

amazing (0/0 people found this helpful)

Concise, written in an accessible style, uses plain english and still has academic commentary. (1/1 people found this helpful)

Best first year book (1/1 people found this helpful)

Good but not the best (2/2 people found this helpful)

Basic Textbook Reading (1/1 people found this helpful)

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