Stephen Spotte

I received this through Librarything Early Reviewers. For me, this is a complicated review to write because it's a complicated book. The main character is called to a medieval French Ecclesiastical courtroom. He has been summoned by the bishop to be the defense attorney for the defendants in three trials, rats in the area, who are accused of crimes against humanity, mainly eating all the barley in the fields and in the city storehouses, a pig who eats a baby, and a man accused of being a werewolf. What follows are trials that, if the charges were against a human, would seem cruel and archaic today but against animals it is comically absurd. It is also very clever and witty. I really enjoyed the arguments.The main target seemed to be religion and how it forms public beliefs. But it was very slow going for me and I got bogged down in tedious arguments. I applaud the author, a marine biologist, for learning so much about the law. interesting book.… (mehr)