Nevertheless, although most definitely unusual and quirky, this book still has plenty to offer in terms of conventional reference – albeit delivered in an original and humorous format. And despite the fact that it is divided into two sections called Conventional Nottinghamshire and Quirky Nottinghamshire, even the Conventional half is riddled with quirkiness. So although you get key facts and figures along with a detailed history from the Stone Age to present day, the whole section is interspersed with the book’s idiosyncratic “Quirk Alerts”; like an anecdote called “George’s Grill” showing up in prehistoric times, along with an 18 century nod to Game of Thrones and a lateral 19 century reference to Vampire Diaries!

However, understandably it is the Quirky Nottinghamshire section where things turn really strange, and where a seemingly random almanac of 55 Nottinghamshire places have their quirkiest facts laid bare: like which Nottinghamshire villages are home to a lethal Roman curse, an eight foot trumpet and the Black Pig Dancers, which one swapped sides of the Trent in the 16 century and which one saw the capture of the evil Black Panther in 1975; or how about Harry Potter’s gravestone, an oven made of gravestones, the Flying Bedstead, Britain’s Festival Village of 1951 and Britain’s “hardest pub”; and not forgetting a pub chair that increases fertility, a house haunted by an inebriated butler and an evil bishop, plus a village who put cows on thatched roofs to keep them topped up on straw!

If you think you know Nottinghamshire, read this fascinating and profusely illustrated book and think again…