You’re unlikely to be gunned down on the street by someone you’ve never met. But you may well be stabbed to death in the comfort of your own home. More than fifty per cent of all murders in Australia each year are classified as ‘domestic’, that is, they involve a death caused by another family member, whether it be a mother, father, spouse, de facto, child or stepchild. The Australian Book of Family Murders contains over twenty of the most remarkable and bizarre cases of death by a family member – from fire, poison, gunshots, knife wounds, and bare-handed brute strength – over the past one hundred years.
