The subject of this book is Fr Rowland Broomhead, a Catholic priest whose ancestral origins lay in rural Yorkshire, but who spent much of his pastoral life in urban Manchester. In the book's preface the author describes Broomhead as a ‘forgotten priest’. And that he certainly appears to have been. Like many readers, I suspect, I too, was unfamiliar with the life of Rowland Broomhead. However, it soon became clear that his story is one that is well worth telling. For far from being insular, and inward looking, concerned only with his own Catholic flock, Broomhead we are told enthusiastically engaged with the rapidly evolving society of which he was a part. The author insists that whilst the book looks at the life of Broomhead, a Catholic priest, it is not restricted to the field of local or denominational history, but rather ‘explores the life and times of Rowland Broomhead from the perspective of citizen, educationalist and churchman’. With this in mind he illustrates, with varying degrees of success, the pastoral and civic activities of the ‘good Fr Broomhead’. The Catholic response to the rapid urbanisation and industrialisation of the early nineteenth century forms one of the central themes of this study. The Manchester in which Broomhead spent much of his priestly years evolved rapidly, even dramatically, with huge numbers of people coming from the countryside in search of work in the city's factories and mills. Many of the new arrivals were Catholics, whose pastoral and social needs had to be catered for. Broomhead was pivotal in the erection of the chapels at Mulberry Street and Granby Row, and those in outlying towns, and devoted much time to charitable and educational enterprises, which extended beyond his own flock. In death Broomhead was remembered fondly by the thousands of Mancunians who lined the city's streets to pay their respects at his funeral. Lupton does an admirable job in bringing his life and works to readers’ attention, and this book will be of interest to those not solely with a bent for Catholic history. Telling this story he uses an impressive body of source material, both of a religious and secular nature, and provides readers with an extensive and interesting set of appendices. In many ways the attraction for readers of this book is the fact that Broomhead's life corresponded with many of the important changes taking place within English Catholicism at that time; a Church evolving from a predominantly rural, ‘recusant’- led faith to one that by the early decades of the nineteenth century was becoming increasingly urban, and ever more populated by immigrant Irish Catholics.