Summary

The novel opens with an author's note explaining that the novel is based on 1830s Oxford. She gives sources and offers some explanations for narrative changes.

The unique style of textbook-type narration means that the novel often shifts between the present and past tense. Anything that revolves around the main characters in this Lesson Plan is written in the present for sake of simplicity. Whenever the narrator steps in to talk about historical events, the summary will be written depending on whether they are referring to past or future events and marked accordingly.

Book I: Chapter One starts with a quote by Antonio de Nebrija. He says language thrives and crumbles alongside empires.

Professor Richard Lovell reaches an address written in his diary to find a boy as the only one left alive. He expects to die of the plague like...