A Place For Everything: The Curious History of Alphabetical Order (Paperback)

Marvellous . . . I read it with astonished delight . . . It is equally scholarly and entertaining. - Jan Morris

Quirky and compelling . . . She is a meticulous historian with a taste for the offbeat; the story of the alphabet suits her well . . . Fascinating. - Dan Jones, Sunday Times

A library and academic essential. - Libby Purves, The Times

One of the many fascinations of Judith Flanders’s book is that it reveals what a weird, unlikely creation the alphabet is. - Joe Moran, Guardian

Judith Flanders’s A Place for Everything presents itself as a history of alphabetical order, but in fact it is more than that. Rather, as the title suggests, it offers something like a general history of the various ways humans have sorted and filed the world around them – a Collison –level view of the matter, in which alphabetical order is just one system among many.’ - Dennis Duncan, The Spectator

Judith Flanders has a knack for making odd subjects accessible . . . In A Place for Everything, the popular historian paints alphabetisation as one of our most radical acts. . . Flanders retains a sense of fun . . . finds contemporary resonance in humanity's search for order. - i

Praise for Judith Flanders' previous book, Christmas: A Biography: 'A catalogue of colourful information, and as surprising an assortment of items as any you might find heaped up under a tree.' - Lucy Hughes-Hallett, Observer

A well-researched account. There are more footnotes here than there are presents under a Rockefeller Christmas tree. Indeed, the book is stuffed with facts – enough to satiate even the most ravenous postprandial taste for quizzing. - Sunday Times

[An] entertaining biography . . . Following the fine tradition of light entertainment Christmas books, Judith Flanders provides lots of trivia . . . However, there is much more to it than that. Flanders is a respected social historian, best known for studies on Victorian life, and the strength of this warm book lies in its quiet erudition. - The Times

Judith Flanders . . . likes Christmas (I think), but she loves reality and its awkward, amusing facts. (A previous book of hers, Inside the Victorian Home, is deep, bright and encompassing.) - New York Times

The non-fiction I most enjoyed . . . an excellent subject, carried out with exemplary care and authority. - Philip Hensher, Spectator