Ever one to dig up the disgusting aspects of "great" eras of the past—as in his Horrible Histories for younger readers—Terry Deary takes a more adult turn in this set of darkly hilarious, gruesomely accurate accounts. While spreading "civilization," the Roman Empire invented all kinds of ways to kill people, from animal maulings staged for cheering crowds to painful poisons slipped to bad rulers and inconvenient heirs, all described in juicy detail. As an Elizabethan you could find yourself tortured if your religion fell out of favor, or starving to death in the navy, or killed in your own bed by an escaped bear. Nor was safety paramount on Victoria's railways, where robberies were rampant, brakes were once a "luxury," and boilers had a tendency to explode.