Just as Peter Ackroyds bestselling London is the biography of the city Thames: Sacred River" is the biography of the river from sea to source. Exploring its history from prehistoric times to the present day the reader is drawn into an extraordinary world learning about the fishes that swam in the river & the boats that plied its surface; about floods & tides; hauntings & suicides; miasmas & malaria; locks weirs & embankments; bridges docks & palaces. Peter Ackroyd has a genius for digging out the most surprising & entertaining details & for writing about them in the most magisterial prose; the result is a wonderfully readable & captivating guide to this extraordinary river & the towns & villages which line it."