As a nation, we’ve long had something of a fascination with the macabre, and long before TV gave us the ability to trawl Netflix and Amazon for endless true crime documentaries, citizens of the UK had to work a little harder to get their gore. Ex-police investigator Blessin Adams has swapped working on current crimes to focus on the crimes of yesteryear and has uncovered some absolute shockers in Great And Horrible News.
To say early modern Britain was a brutal place to live is something of an understatement. With early forms of policing coming in the form of coroners and clergymen, justice – or lack thereof – was swift and ruthless. The press was also in its infancy at this point, so crimes, particularly ones of the more gruesome nature, were written about in the form of one- or two-sheet pamphlets. The majority of these, along with coroners’ reports, diaries and parish records, lurk in the dusty vaults of old libraries and churches: Adams sought out these historical articles and pieced them together, to offer us a glimpse into Britain’s bloodstained past and what motivated the killers of the old.
Written in the form of short stories, the narrative of Great And Horrible News is exciting and insightful. Adams’ detailed depiction of the era is as close as you would want to get without actually being there, and at points you may have to remind yourself these were actual crimes. One depressing thought arises: in 500 years of history, nothing much has changed in terms of people’s will to murder.
Great And Horrible News: Murder And Mayhem In Modern Britain, Blessin Adams (William Collins)
Price: £18.99/£9.99 Ebook/£13.99 audiobook. Info: here
words CHRIS ANDREWS
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