Corpus Delicti is a German dystopian novel by Juli Zeh. It was published in 2009.
In the mid-21st century, Germany is a nice place to live. The streets and everything else are clean — hell, houses that are best at being clean even get awarded with the seal "Guardhouse". The people are perfectly healthy (well, at least physically) and live long lives — at least usually. Everything overseen by bacteriometers in any regular house, toilets that analyze their users' urine immediately and microchips injected into every person — and under the guarding eyes of the Method, the system ruling it all.
A nice life — or not?
34-year-old Mia Holl mourns the death of her younger brother Moritz. Moritz was incarcerated for rape-murder, but she is convinced of his innocence. When TV journalist Heinrich Kramer visits her, she finally seems to get a chance to clear his name — only to start questioning the Method more and more. No good idea in a system that claims to be infallible and unquestionably for the good of everyone...
Santé! Those are the tropes in the book:
- Allegorical Character: Heinrich Kramer, the personified Method the same as the power of the media.
- Amoral Attorney: Double Subverted. Lutz Rosentreter is first seen loyally working for the system, but then seems like one of the low percentage of lawyers who are not fully believing in the Method, and later gives a pro-Method confession.
- An Aesop: Several. "It is perfectly fine that life is life-threatening. Do not give up your freedom for security.", or "The body is volatile, but the mind can live on forever.", or "Never forget caring for your mental health.", or "Every society system is flawed.", or "Dictatorship is never good, even if it explicitly wants the wellbeing of the people."
- Artistic License – Biology: There is nothing known about our immune systems influencing the quality of our relationships. Could be an in-universe example of Science Marches On.
- Better to Die than Be Killed: Moritz' reasoning behind his suicide, although "being killed" would mean being turned into a Human Popsicle in the setting. For Moritz, this means being kept as a trophy by the regime.
- Big Brother Is Employing You: Implied for Mia, who is a biologist, meaning one of the people presumably working to form and hold up the system. Played straight for all characters who work in law or media.
- Big Brother Is Watching: Constant surveillance of any step the citizens take is absolutely crucial for the Method to work. They all wear tracking chips, and every everyday gadget has sensors to control its users' health stats.
- Blind Date: Moritz liked to go to them and also went to one in the backstory.
- Bureaucratically Arranged Marriage: Downplayed. There is still a choice for the individual citizen, but everyone can only choose their partners from the people in the "immune groups" deemed fitting to them.
- Chaste Hero: Mia is single, never acts interested into any form of romantic or sexual relationship and is maybe asexual or even aromantic.
- Cold-Blooded Torture: Mia gets tortured with electric shocks. She requests Heinrich Kramer to watch in the hopes of a Heel Realization. He is unimpressed.
- Conveniently an Orphan: The Holl siblings' parents are only seen in a flashback and seem not to be alive anymore at the time of the main plot. That doesn't mess with their children's lives anyway.
- Crapsaccharine World: Well, Germany seems to be a nice place to live under the Method — clean cities, renewable energy, vibrant culture, eradicated poverty and perfectly healthy people. The truth is that everything comes with a price — society is terribly unfree, surveillance is everywhere, people snitch on each other frequently and even small trespasses against the Method like drinking alcohol once are treated like something close to terrorism.
- Clear My Name: Mia views herself on this kind of quest regarding her brother.
- Cruel Mercy: The ending, courtesy of Heinrich Kramer. Mia isn't turned into a Human Popsicle, but instead scheduled to be properly reindoctrinated - what will most likely succeed due to her bad mental state at that point.
- Dating Service Disaster: Moritz goes on a blind date. The woman is not at all like he expects her to be — she isn't even alive anymore.
- Despair Event Horizon: Moritz crosses it after having to go to prison for a terrible crime he did not commit. Hence his suicide.
- Dirty Coward: Lutz Rosentreter. He first seems to be an ally to Mia because It's Personal, but after his separation from his immunologically incompatible girlfriend, he shows himself as a Method loyalist.
- Drugs Are Bad: The Method's view, which is the reason why alcohol, cigarettes and even candy are illegal.
- Dystopian Edict: No disease! That means nothing that could ever damage your body in any way!
- Forced to Watch: Mia tries to invoke this trope on Kramer when she gets tortured.
- Future Food Is Artificial: Real food is a scarcity and seen as {{Squick]] by most people. You usually eat artificial protein or vitamin from tubes. Moritz Holl was one of the few people who still like natural food, like self-caught fish.
- Future Slang: Heinrich Kramer greets people with "Santé!" instead of any normal greeting.
- Genre Savvy: The Method never kills its opponents for the sake of not seeming like a murderous regime in case it fails in the future, despite its claims to be infallible.
- Gone Horribly Right: The Method. Everyone is healthy and everything is clean — but there is a "too clean" for human health, and it is implied that nobody's immune system is fully intact anymore, so the Method has to stay in place forever to ensure that no epidemic breaks out.
- Government Drug Enforcement: Inverted. Any type of drug is strictly illegal under the Method, and there are even legal punishments for minor trespasses like drinking alcohol or smoking.
- Hollywood Atheist: Heinrich Kramer is atheist, views religion founders and religious people as crazy and believes in the very science-based Method with religious passion.Mia Holl: I do not believe in God and he does not believe in me.
- Human Popsicle: The equivalent punishment to execution under the Method. Subverted regarding Mia in the end: she shall be frozen, but is freed.
- Imaginary Friend: Exaggerated with an Imaginary Lover or "Ideal Beloved", Moritz' imaginary girlfriend, who is passed on to Mia.
- Jesus Was Crazy: Invoked by Heinrich Kramer, who calls him a "bearded masochist".
- Littlest Cancer Patient: Moritz Holl was this in the past, having had leukemia with six years. It was a crucial step in him becoming a very philosophical and wise adult who is eager for life.
- Living Is More than Surviving: Mia Holl's crucial revelation.
- Meaningful Name:
- Heinrich Kramer, named after an infamous witch hunter.
- Mia Holl, after Maria Holl, a woman burnt as a witch by the real-life Heinrich Kramer.
- Lutz Rosentreter (the surname translates to "rose stepper") is in love with a woman he isn't allowed to love due to incompatible immune systems. In the book, he solves the conflict with the Method by ending his relationship, metaphorically "stepping on the rose".
- Würmer, Kramer's spineless, slimy younger colleague (the name translates to "worms" in English).
- Named After Someone Famous: Heinrich Kramer has the same name like the author of the infamous witch-hunting manual Malleus maleficarum. Maria Holl was the name of a real woman that was burnt as a witch under his oversight.
- Omniscient Council of Vagueness: We only get to know that Heinrich Kramer was one of several masterminds behind the Method. We never get to know more about what kind of system it exactly is and never see anyone who is an actual member of The Government.
- Outgrown Such Silly Superstitions: Nobody seems to be religious anymore, and religious buildings are only depicted as parts of a museum. Heinrich Kramer even calls Jesus a "bearded masochist".
- Passing the Torch: What Moritz did when handing the Ideal Beloved to Mia.
- Ruins of the Modern Age: The book depicts factories that were turned into culture centers and a museum consisting of churches.
- The Casanova: Moritz, who had many short flings with women during his life. A little downplayed since he was looking for an ideal love anyway.
- There Are No Therapists: Strangely, the Method seems to negate mental issues.
- Totalitarian Utilitarian: The Method is a philosophical and political system that aims to grant everyone a life free of pain and suffering — and ironically gives the citizens even more of them. Heinrich Kramer is this as a person.
- Tracking Chip: Everyone under the Method has a chip implanted into their body that is not just used for tracking and identification purposes, but also to examine their health all the time.
- Walls of Tyranny: Human settlements are behind a fence that separates them from the world outside (forests and free nature). This is since the outside world is basically considered plague area.
