PUNISHMENT

translated by Katharina Hall (Baskerville £12.99, 224pp)

THe cool, crisp narrator of these 12 bleak tales casts a world-weary eye over brutal crimes, neighbourly conflicts and unexpected comeuppances.

Translated with economical elegance by Hall (who had to master the complexities of the german judicial system and the handling and dismantling of a gun for this collection), and informed by insider knowledge — von Schirach was a defence lawyer for 20 years — it’s a chilling insight into a flawed justice system, the people who work in it and the guilty and guileless who find themselves judged.

Here, there’s a short, silly assistant supermarket manager who steals an underworld drug stash (The Small Man);

an ambitious young woman who finds herself morally compromised when she provides legal counsel for a violent, merciless sex trafficker (Subbotnik); and a mother who takes revenge on her hated husband (A Light Blue Day).