The regulation of sexual activity is a topic not far from the news headlines in any era it seems, but, as Martin Ingram points out, ‘it is incontrovertible that legal regulation of sexual behaviour in both men and women was so important as to be a defining feature of late medieval and early modern society’ (p.32). The era covered by the book is one in which age at first marriage was late, and where disentangling oneself from an unsuitable marriage was normally only possible in the sense of a formal separation from ‘bed and board’ which left neither party lawfully able to remarry. Inevitably, this led to many circumstances in which sexual activity outside marriage, or sinful ‘fleshely medlynge’ as William Harrington put it in 1515 (p.44), was brought to the attention both of the state and the church courts. With this in mind this book seeks answers to the key questions of ‘How was the law used to control sex in Tudor England?’ and ‘What were the differences between secular and religious practice?’ One of the ways in which the book answers these questions is by demonstrating the extent to which ordinary people concerned themselves with the sexual lives of their peers. And indeed, as Ingram observes, this was a society ‘where people were expected to observe their neighbours’ behaviour and to evaluate their sexual “honesty”’ (p.32). For cases to reach the courts incidents, suspicions or behavioural patterns had to be reported, either formally or through the spreading of gossip which was rife in this era (p.194). Thus the book is infused with stories and words of those accused of sexual misconduct, such as John Wymborne who in January 1478 was brought before a church court for adultery with Alice Norton. The couple denied the offence but were ordered to stay away from one another, only to be cited again in the October, at which time Wymborne admitted that ‘he was in the house of the said Agnes, around ten o'clock of the night’. Wymborne himself then sued a neighbour only the following month for spreading the rumour that he had been ‘found between the legs of a certain woman’ (pp.127–8). As in this instance, Ingram's examples show time and again that language used in the charges is often remarkably direct. The depth of research and skilled analysis offered by Carnal knowledge adds to the sum of scholarly understanding of attitudes to sexual behaviours and its consequences in premodern England in ways which mean that for anyone interested in social, ecclesiastical or sexual history this book is required reading. Its recent publication in paperback makes this study available to a wider audience and so is welcome.