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Mausoleums - magnificent, monumental tombs - are often haunting, powerful buildings in evocative sites, from rolling hills and beautiful parkland to gloomy churchyards and crowded Victorian cemeteries. The author reveals their history, beginning with the great tomb at Halicarnassos built for King Mausolos of Caria by his wife Queen Artemisia in the fourth century BC, which gave the monuments their name. She explains the details of their architecture, ranging from massive Egyptianate landmarks through elegant Georgian temples to lavishly decorated Victorian tombs, and considers the motives of mausoleum builders. A substantial, well-illustrated gazetteer completes the book, leading the reader on a journey from the remote Sinclair Mausoleum in the north of Caithness - a tiny castle known as Harold's Tower - to the hugely ornate Royal Mausoleum in Windsor. The gazetteer includes over a hundred and fifty examples of these curious, compelling buildings, which challenge our preconceptions of response to death.

• 'Mad Jack' Fuller was buried in a pyramidal mausoleum in Brightling churchyard, East Sussex, where he is said to be seated, wearing a top hat and clutching a bottle of claret.

• The colossal mausoleum of the tenth Duke of Hamilton at Hamilton, South Lanarkshire, was so heavy that it sank 7 metres into the ground in a hundred years. It contains a chapel that has a fifteen-second echo.

• Because of her fear of being buried alive, Mrs Perkins of Christchurch, Dorset, was buried above ground in a mausoleum, so that her cries would be heard if she revived. However, her body was removed after her husband's death, and the mausoleum was sold.