Shashi Tharoor began reading books—Enid Blyton’s Noddy series—when he was three. For many years afterward, he read a book a day. Bookless in Baghdad brings together pieces written by this compulsive reader and prolific writer on the subject closest to his heart: reading. Tharoor takes us on a delightful journey of discovery, as he wanders the book souk in a Baghdad under sanctions where the middle-class are selling their volumes so that they can afford to live, and drives around Huesca looking to pay an idiosyncratic tribute to George Orwell.