Long before they were created in large quantities, books bound with reeds from the banks of the Nile were prized possessions. Award-winning author Irene Vallejo takes readers on a journey through the ancient world's vibrant literary culture and the valiant efforts that ensured this illustrious tradition would endure. She visits the sites of Hypatia's murder, Cleopatra's palaces, Alexander the Great's battlefields, Mount Vesuvius eruptions, and Cleopatra's battlefields. Aristophanes' censorship of humorists, Sappho's empowerment of women's voices, and Seneca's challenge of a post-truth world are just a few of the fascinating tales about spies, scribes, illuminators, librarians, booksellers, authors, and statesmen whose rich and occasionally complicated engagement with the written word bear striking similarities to the world today are interspersed throughout. Vallejo takes us to mountainous landscapes and the roaring sea, to the capitals where culture flourished and the furthest reaches where knowledge found refuge in chaotic times. In this sweeping tour of the history of books, the wonder of the ancient world comes alive and along the way we discover the singular power of the written word.