This lively book introduces children to the fascinating story of libraries, explaining how they began and what they do. It describes Nineveh's library of clay tablets twenty-five hundred years ago, King Ptolemy's famous collection of papyrus rolls, the medieval libraries with their monk librarians, and many other unusual and colorful libraries up to the present day. It also tells what to expect when you visit your own library for the first time.

Written by a former children's book editor with a lifelong interest in the subject and delightfully illustrated in color on every page, Libraries will give boys and girls a beginning awareness of an important part of their cultural heritage.

From the dust jacket