Ben Schroeder

Ben Schroeder, a talented young man from an East End Jewish family, has been accepted as a pupil into the Chambers of Bernard Wesley QC. But Schroeder is an outsider, not part of this privileged society, where wealth and an Oxbridge education are essentials. He encounters prejudice, intrigue and scandal.

In Harold Macmillan's Britain of the early 1960s the Bar is dominated by white, privileged, Oxbridge men. Underneath a profession which proudly flaunts its integrity and traditions lies a world of hypocrisy and ruthless self-interest. When scandal threatens, self-preservation is the only goal and no one is indispensable. Ben Schroeder, a talented young man from an East End Jewish family, has been accepted as a pupil into the chambers of Bernard Wesley, QC. But Schroeder is an outsider, not part of this privileged society, where wealth and an Oxbridge education are essentials.

It is 1964 and Ben Schroeder, first introduced in A Higher Duty, is building his career at the Bar; juggling the demands of different challenging cases, while trying to allow a little romance into his life.