The Bible is not a book. Its title comes from the Greek biblia, books; it is a collection, or library. That the Bible has become a single book, or even the book for some, is a remarkable and sometimes problematic accident, and the premise for this engaging tour through one part of its history.

Lori Anne Ferrell’s The Bible and the People is not a history of the Bible or even, as its title might suggest, of the popular uses and understandings of Jewish or Christian scriptures. It is the story of ‘a Bible’, the English Bible, and ‘a people’, ultimately the people of the United States. Even though more than half of the book deals with Bibles older than the American colonies, the narrative thread that binds its discussions of particular books and readers comes from an interest in what happens to the Bible when it crosses the Atlantic.

More specifically, the book arises from an exhibition curated by the author from the holdings of the Huntington Library. The politics of this collection are not addressed, which is a pity. The presence in San Marino, California, of items including the remarkable Gundulf Bible and a Gutenberg Bible bespeaks more than piety. However, the fact that Ferrell’s discussion is grounded in particular books, rather than just the idea of one, is a strength.