Imagine traveling back in time to the fourteenth century, hundreds of years before electricity, indoor plumbing, and modern medicine. What would you eat? What would you wear? Where do you live? How do you travel? Was life really better for a lord or a king?
In "The Time Traveler's Guide to Medieval England," Ian Mortimer strips away the names, dates, and battles to put the reader in the starring role, walking through daily life in England in the Middle Ages. He shows what it really would have been like to live through this time, detailing everything from the horrors of war to the haute couture of the day.
As a historical guidebook, "The Time Traveler's Guide to Medieval England" answers questions typically ignored in traditional histories. Readers will learn how to greet people on the street, what to use as toilet paper, why a physician might want to taste blood, among other esoteric tidbits. Mortimer's book shows readers that the past is not just something to be studied, but something to be lived.

Ian Mortimer is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and was awarded the Alexander Prize in 2004 for his work on the social history of medicine. He holds a Ph.D. in history and a higher doctorate from the University of Exeter. He has penned five other medieval books, most recently the revolutionary study Medieval Intrigue: Decoding Royal Conspiracies. He has also worked for several archive and historical research organizations in the UK, where he lives with his wife and children. Visit Ian at IanMortimer.com.