In 1914 when the war draws the young men of Britain away to fight it is the women who must keep the nation running. Two of those women are Peggy and Maude twin sisters who work in the bindery at Oxford University Press in Jericho. Peggy is intelligent ambitious and dreams of going to Oxford University but for most of her life she has been told her job is to bind the books not read them. Maude meanwhile wants nothing more than what she has. She is extraordinary but vulnerable. Peggy needs to watch over her. When refugees arrive from the devastated cities of Belgium it sends ripples through the community and through the sisters' lives. Peggy begins to see the possibility of another future where she can use her intellect and not just her hands but as war and illness reshape her world it is love and the responsibility that comes with it that threaten to hold her back. In this beautiful companion to the international bestseller The Dictionary of Lost Words Pip Williams explores another little-known slice of history seen through women's eyes. Evocative subversive and rich with unforgettable characters The Bookbinder of Jericho is a story about knowledge who gets to make it who gets to access it and what is lost when it is withheld.