The Frozen Thames by Helen Humphreys

Forty times over the course of recorded history, the Thames has frozen through, giving rise to frost fairs and temporary bridges, royal spectacles and common fare, ice skating and drownings. Winters cold enough to freeze a river freeze ale, wine, ink pots, too. They kill those who don't keep moving. They precipitate new forms of entertainment, and despair.

In forty brief chapters, in a book called simply, The Frozen Thames, Helen Humphreys conjures a scene from each of the forty freezings—an o