Book excerpt: This volume presents a new account, informed by recent scholarship on ancient narrative fiction, of a world that calls to mind the scenes of the Palestrina mosaic, with ships traversing the Nile delta, hippopotamus hunting, religious processions and festivities, and leizurely sightseeing. The commentary argues that the author was most probably an erudite Alexandrian with a polymathic interest in topics as diverse as the arrival of the phoenix in Heliopolis, contemporary art, medical theories of the function of blood in causing psychological imbalances in the young, herbal remedies for poisoning, and the colour of Nile water in glass.