Phantom in the library! The bizarre true story of a Victorian haunting revealed! King cholera! The day that death came to the Dock family! Exploding mummies! The weirdest events of the blitz examined! A Yorkshire tragedy: Fifteenth-century murder at Calverley Hall! Leeds has one of the darkest histories on record. From the fatal Dripping Riot of 1865, sparked by the theft of two pounds of congealed fat, to the violin-playing killer Charles Peace, said to still haunt the city's prison cells, you will find all manner of horrible events inside this book. With plague and disease in the city slums, dreadful disasters in Roundhay Park, and riots in the city centre, this is the real story of Yorkshire's first city.

Richard Smyth spent several years as an editor before becoming a freelance writer and researcher. He writes regular articles for magazines including History Today, as well as that publication's monthly crossword. He also sets the questions for the BBC's Mastermind, on which he was a finalist in 2008. He organises and hosts a monthly short-fiction event in Leeds and is well known for his contributions to the website My Life in Leeds. He lives in Roundhay.