The fragrance of old and new books- you ask any book lover and this stands apart as one of their indulgences. Cloud Cuckoo land is a story that celebrates the love for books and gives you a whiff of this fragrance, through words. Set in three timelines and places (15th Century-Constantinople, 2020 - Idaho and in a certain unspecified near future timeframe in an interstellar ship), the book is a clever compilation of narratives from 5 protagonists whose destinies are interlinked to help uplift the destiny of a lost ancient text while the text in many ways becomes their beacon of hope to make progress in life and to march onwards. In a beautiful symbiotic relationship, the book saves them as much as they help resurrect the book. With his clever writing style, Anthony Doerr makes the reader work towards building that narrative much like a jigsaw puzzle and that's part of the thrill of reading this book. Chapters are small yet very detailed in presentation, which gives the impression