Panicology
By Simon Briscoe and Hugh Aldersey-Williams
Viking £18.99, 303 pages
FT bookshop price: £15.19

The premise of Panicology is an excellent idea for a book. The dust-jacket promises it will “strip away the hysteria which surrounds over 40 of today’s most common scare stories”. And it’s “witty and revealing” to boot.