Test Case: Mr C

by Philip Palmer

In 1993 an inmate with schizophrenia at Broadmoor, Harold, developed gangrene in his foot and was transferred to a hospital where the decision was taken to amputate. Harold disagreed and set in motion a landmark legal case in the high court that was to enshrine the test of mental capacity in the 2005 Mental Capacity Act.

Audiobook

First published February 4, 2014

About the author

Philip Palmer is a British science fiction and fantasy novelist and an award-winning screenwriter and radio dramatist whose credits include productions for the BBC starring Iain McDiarmid and Simon Russell Beale.

His novels blend dark humour, genre-bending world-building, and relentless plot momentum. Hell on Earth, his alternate-London crime thriller set in a world where Hell is literally a borough, was named a Finalist in the 2026 American Book Fest Legacy Book Awards. Lavie Tidhar (World Fantasy Award winner) calls his work 'magical madness', and agent and editor John Jarrold calls Hell on Earth 'brilliant: horrific, gripping and darkly humorous'.

His other books include the SF thriller Version 43, the space opera Hell Ship, the novella Morpho, the horror novella Murder of the Heart, and the magical realist thriller The Great West Wood.

Readers who love China Mieville, Ben Aaronovitch, or dark British urban fantasy will find a new favourite here.