A Place for Everything: The Curious History of Alphabetical Order Hardcover – October 20, 2020

Obviously well researched. She handles details deftly. No cute banter! Extraordinary clarity. Clean supple prose. One of the most satisfying books I've read in years.

This book provides insight on every page from beginning to end! These insights delight me. This book is a thoroughly enjoyable read from beginning to end.

Interesting but maybe too much detail.

There isn't a lot of adventure in the story of how alphabetization gradually took over as the dominant organizing principle of information in the alphabet-using world. But if you're intrinsically interested in what amounts to a meta-history of Western thought, this is a clear, engaging, and amazingly detailed book.

The author points out that the alphabet is the means not the end. We take for granted our system of sorting and filing and finding just about everything by using the alphabet. I approached this book out of curiosity but discovered so many interesting and fascinating tidbits. You need not be an academic to enjoy this book simply someone who is curious about learning something new each day.

item (book was just as advertised and a good read!)

I have to admit that I never even considered why we order so many things alphabetically, what people did before that, and what people who don't have an alphabet like ours do to put things in order. Judith Flanders answers all these questions, and that is interesting enough, but she also goes off on side trips now and then that are also fascinating. I enjoyed learning that Danish soldiers in the 19th century were categorized according to literacy and there were six levels involving ability write and to read writing or printing. Which makes you think, just what does it mean to be literate? There is also some discussion about Dewey and his decimal system and other forms of organizing and their pluses and minuses. Sometimes the subject at hand was not as interesting to me, but I just skimmed ahead and it was never long before some other intriguing topic came up. The footnotes are a treat and the bibliography is a wealth of leads for further reading. I want to look up a few of the books about the early days of the telephone and operators and telephone numbers. (Thanks to Basic Books and NetGalley for a digital review copy.)

This is one of those books that you can pick up and put down at any time...not because you're not interested, but because the wonderful knowledge jumps off every page. You could easily spend a weekend reading it or spend a month, a bit at a time...both journeys would be enlightening and delightful!

Enjoyable read, and learned quite a lot of things I did not know. Highly recommended.

The author traces the use of various systems for placing items in order, and the evolution of the alphabetic way.Fascinating and highly readable.

I have enjoyed as far as I've got - about a third of the way - but I must admit it's rather more eruditely detailed than I had expected.

For the non-specialist reader, I found this too academic and overlong.It certainly made me think and be aware of how alphabetic order became the 'default', but I ended up skipping lots of it towards the end.

Too long and obscure