In general, I would say I’m not the intended audience of this book. It’s definitely a pop linguistics book, and therefore as someone with a degree in linguistics, I didn’t learn that much from it and so I don’t really have that much to say about it.
Nevertheless, I think the book is very intelligently written—as one would expect from Mr. David Crystal himself. I’ve been vaguely following his work since I first found him in high school (over a decade, now), and I’ve always been thoroughly impressed by his knowledge and understanding of the English language, especially past varieties of it. I own three of his books, including his Encyclopedia of the English Language and The Stories of English. His Encyclopedia is much more in line with my personal body of knowledge, and it’s nice to see Crystal’s range in writing. He has the ability to communicate information to a wide variety of people and share his findings on all levels.
Aside from his purview of the evolution of each letter in the alphabet (I found this lacking, brief, and simplistic), I enjoyed the scholarship presented in the book. The story of English spelling unfurled in an intuitive and easy-to-follow manner; his chronological approach rarely failed him, and he had to deviate from it only rarely into asides. Most of the content in the book I had already known from schooling and from my independent research, but I was delighted when I did come across new information. Crystal’s writing is fun to experience and engage with, and this made learning with him exciting and enjoyable overall.
Rather than a scholarly exploration of the evolution of English spelling, I would say the book is formatted more so to focus on a general survey coupled with “fun facts” that would keep the average reader invested. However, it being a clear pop linguistics book aimed at an audience with little to no understanding of linguistics, I think this is not only an acceptable approach to the topic but indeed an ideal one. Overall I enjoyed the book, and I was able to get through it quickly while thoroughly enjoying it. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in English orthography and especially English learners, as it does a great job explaining spelling systems employed in our language. The aim is clear: through Crystal’s exploration of the history, we can come to understand why English spelling is “like that,” and how we can come to be better spellers ourselves.