Published in a series dedicated to microhistorical approaches, these fascinating case studies of sixteenth-century change derive from the author's long-standing engagement with London parish records. Complementing in-depth examinations of rural settings (memorably Eamon Duffy's Voices of Morebath) and other city environments (such as the work of Clive Burgess on All Saints, Bristol), Gary Gibbs provides us with a series of bottom-up surveys of local ecclesiastical communities in the capital. Selected to represent different settings, challenges and inhabitant profiles, these five parishes underline the key roles of institutional continuities, collective leadership and socio-economic constellations in the negotiation of doctrinal and socio-political transformations. Among other themes and processes, Allhallows London Wall highlights a distinct type of fund-raising regime (including contributions by an anchorite), St Michael Cornhill gradual shifts from intercessory to philanthropic priorities, St Stephen Coleman Street expanding lay powers (right up to the acquisition of the benefice and election of the vicar), St Botolph Aldgate multi-layered reasons behind communal conflict and St Peter Westcheap the hegemony of goldsmiths over parochial affairs in an area of special importance for civic display. Alongside the agency of officials and ‘masters’, particular attention is paid to the notoriously elusive parts played by women and the poor. St Stephen, for example, affords fascinating glimpses of gender-specific devotions (like the ‘iiij cots for owr ladye’ used for the ritual cloaking of a statue of Mary on a rood screen altar; pp. 95–6) as well as the transient population of secluded alleyways. Another pervasive concern is source critique, above all the specific manners in which communities compiled and used churchwardens’ accounts, which requires meticulous contextualisation and inhibits easy deductions about prevailing beliefs. Evolving religious practices, new communal duties and material culture also receive sustained consideration, but the main emphasis lies on social factors and the ways in which prominent individuals and groups ‘localised’ the Tudor Reformations. If there is a principal conclusion, it is that ‘status … mattered most in the organization of parish culture’ (p. 169). While the case study structure necessitates some repetitions (regarding the character of successive reigns) and the maps are not always large enough to identify features discussed in the text, taken together the chapters convey an illuminating sense of the complexity of parish experience in a single city, let alone the country as a whole. Might it be argued with Patrick Collinson that such a multitude of vibrant local polities boosted ‘republican’ as well as monarchical ideas within English government? Overall, in line with its series objectives, Five parishes showcases the benefits of reduced analytical scales and their potential to capture imaginations.