Not much to say on this one. It has been highly praised and has been a bestseller, quite popular with the public. It's a scanty book, though, about half the book being spent with explanations of lexicography than with the actual story of Murray (the professor of the title) and Minor (the madman). Still, one cannot be upset with a book that attempts to fill in the blanks in the general conscience. I'm sure there're books out there that I read (Norwich's Byzantium maybe?) that specialists think are a bit too elementary.
So I would still give this book a good rating: it does a noble service while telling an interesting story. Furthermore, Winchester doesn't feel the need to try to make this history have a "moral" or any purpose. Like true history, it is just a slice from the past, selectively told to reflect the story, but there's not desire to give a "plot" that many popular histories seem to desire having.
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