Books on local history often fall into three categories: specific and thick with detail, based on a particular theme, or generalised and random in content. Three new books on Oxfordshire fit this pattern. Brian Read's Henley Rural: The History of Henley Rural District Council 1894-1932 (ELSP, £10) falls squarely into the first category.
Illustrated by black-and-white photographs and the occasional chart, the book follows the development of the area around Henley, Caversham, Stonor and Cuxham early in the last century, including such highlights as the arrival of piped water, improvement of the road and sewerage system and housing problems.
Thus we learn that Nettlebed was not connected to the piped water supply until relatively late due to its elevation, the council failed to provide proper refuse collection in the Great Depression and that Watlington Town Hall was the cause for some of the first complaints dealt with by the council.
The book also promises to highlight how some councillors frustrated change while others, more progressive and far-sighted, tried to improve village life. This is surely open to interpretation, even with hindsight.
This book won't fascinate anyone interested in local government, but for anyone interested in the development of the area it is a well-researched and comprehensive read.
Betty Puttick's Oxfordshire: Stories of the Supernatural (Countryside Books, £6.95) is a much more lively if less well-documented read. Oxfordshire has plenty of sightings to fill the book, which offers the promise that it will unsettle even hardened sceptics.
The book's accounts of ghostly apparitions and mysterious bumps in the night are accompanied by plenty of background information on the spectre's earthly lives and conjecture about why they decided to haunt the county.
The strength of this book lies in the fact that readers will know the buildings and places that are supposedly haunted.
It is fun to think that the Westgate Centre is haunted by Mary Blandy, the notorious poisoner; that Henry II's lover, Rosamund de Clifford, can regularly be seen at the Trout Inn, in Wolvercote; and that a 17th-century stillborn baby can be heard crying in the Bear Inn, in Woodstock.
That said, only the most credulous reader will share Mrs Puttick's belief that "the sheer variety of every aspect of the paranormal illustrates how little we know about the eternal mystery of what happens to us after death"; or that sceptics are ignoring a "vast bulk of evidence" pointing to the existence of ghosts.
But you do not need to swallow that to enjoy the book which, at 96 pages, does not overstay its welcome, unlike many of the characters contained in it.
The final book -- Oxford: Beyond the University by Derek Honey (Affleck Press, £9.95) -- attempts to plug a gap by concentrating on the city without delving into the colleges' dusty histories.
Not a bad idea, but the book's scattergun approach to its subject could leave readers feeling disoriented. The title itself is misleading as it mainly concentrates on personalities who have marked the city over the years, including the artist and writer William Morris, Morse author Colin Dexter, local broadcaster Bill Heine and tycoon Robert Maxwell.
This is woven into an account of Oxford's history that focuses on several highlights, such as the Scholastica's Day Riots, the Civil War and the emergence of Oxpop.
The problem with this approach is that it leaves great gaps in Oxford's history that are barely touched on. Readers wanting to know how the city evolved between the Civil War and the Industrial Revolution will be none the wiser.
The chapters are also confusingly ordered, without regard to chronology. A section on Robert Maxwell's spell as chairman of Oxford United comes after the Scholastics's Day Riots but before the Civil War. Chapter titles such as Gone but not Forgotten, and multiple chapters on Oxford eccentrics and personalities that duplicate each other, do little to help the reader.
This is not a scholarly work and Mr Honey's somewhat constipated writing style does not make for effortless reading, but it does competently cover some of the better-known tales associated with the city.
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