They call Adelaide the city of churches . What they forget is that every church has a graveyard -- and every graveyard is full of skeletons.

Adelaide, an elegantly designed, civilised city, where the inhabitants are known for their love of the arts, good food and fine wine, is also the place where many of Australia s most bizarre and macabre crimes have taken place.

The cases in this book show that Adelaide truly does have another side: from the murder of a transvestite, pro-wrestling truck driver by his two lesbian lodgers (who worked as prostitutes) during an argument over a camera; to the prosecution of an elderly couple by the RSPCA for keeping, in frightful conditions and almost starved to death, a collection of 120 stray dogs and six pigs.

This book is more than a collection of some of the most attention-grabbing, shocking and puzzling cases from the past ten years: it also looks at why it might be that so many have happened in this sunny, conservative, unassuming state capital.