The Book

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 The Book: A Cover-to-cover Exploration of the Most Powerful Object of Our Time, by Keith Houston

Well, I did manage ten books of summer, but I failed to write about the last one.  And I've been very slow with my reading in the last month or so.  As far as I can tell, I've been under enough stress that I don't have a lot of brainpower left over for reading; there are lots of big, heavy tomes on important topics that I want to read, but I mostly take refuge in stitching and fluffy reading.  Of course, I also spend too much time doomscrolling!  I'm trying to spend more energy and time in the real world, but we all know how difficult that can be.  ANYWAY....

I purchased this fun history of books for the library at work several years ago, but didn't plan to read it.  Then Robin Sloan, author of Moonbound, said he'd had a lot of fun with it, and I thought I'd give it a whirl.  It is a fun read!  Of course I know quite a bit about the history of books already (I even had to take a class in library school) but there's always more to learn and Houston brings it.  Plus the book itself is a pleasing volume.

Houston divides his history by parts of the book, such as pages, writing, illustrations, and the form itself.  so he starts with chapters on the development of papyrus, parchment, and paper, then moves to writing, ink, and printing, and so on.  He's much stronger on inventions in China (paper, block printing, etc.) than any other history I've read, which was very nice.  And his writing is informative and witty.

The book itself is printed to show technical details, from the boards and hinge to diagrams labeling every element.  These labels are extremely heavy at first, but (luckily) only occur in the first instance of any element, so there are few after the first chapter.  It's a charming addition that would be tiring if it were taken further.  The book is also well-illustrated in color. 

Book-lovers will enjoy this one a lot; it's just fun, even if you've already read a lot of histories of bibliography.   

 

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