In Your Defence

True Stories of Life and Law

A Sunday Times Bestseller.

​Chosen as a Book of the Year by The Times' Critic's Choice, The Sunday Times, The Spectator and The New Statesman. Longlisted by the Crime Writers Association for a Golden Dagger Award for non-fiction.

It is Sarah Langford's job to stand in court, representing the mad and the bad, the vulnerable, the heartbroken and the hopeful. Each of the eleven real-life stories she tells here draws us into the heart of her life as a criminal and family barrister. Following each case we learn not only something of the law and our legal system, but also what it feels like to work within it. Some have a twist, some a shock, and some are joyously life-affirming. Each asks the reader to consider, in our increasingly polarized world, what is truth, and what is justice, and reminds us that, in our frailty, we are not so different from one another after all.

Published by PenguinRandomHouse

  • “A compelling read for anyone who cares about fairness, justice and humanity.”

    The Observer

  • "Her facility with language makes this, her first book, breezy and congenial, but it is also passionate and, in places, personal."

    Alex Wade - Times Literary Supplement

  • "I greatly enjoyed In Your Defence, an insider’s account of life as a barrister. Justice and the law provide the lens: the subject is really human nature."

    Ed Smith - The New Statesman

  • "The book is by turns heartbreaking and hopeful, and succeeds in giving an articulate, compassionate voice to those who would otherwise struggle to be heard."

    Olivia Potts - The Spectator

  • “Sarah Langford's book gives you the unromantic truth about life as a criminal barrister. In each chapter, she takes a case she was involved with to shed light on the way the law is practised in this country. However, for instance, does a court deal with a child who has been brainwashed into believing his mother is evil? Gripping.”

    The Sunday Times, Books of the Year 2018

  • "The law is endlessly fascinating, in its history, rituals, manners, language and, above all, the people whose lives revolve, temporarily or in the long term, around its practise. ‘In Your Defence’ tells the stories of some of those caught up in its complex workings. It is riveting – and quite alarming."

    The Spectator Books of the Year 2018

  • “This is an absolutely fascinating insider account of life at the bar by defence barrister Sarah Langford, told, with a novelist’s eye, through the stories of 11 ordinary people she’s defended. As Langford journeys through and challenges her own unconscious bias, she’ll make you take a long hard – and not entirely comfortable – look at your own.”

    The Pool

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