I found it in History section of a used book shop. Only saw the "fiction" label on the back when I was cleaning it up. If you like philosophy you might get more out of it. I was expecting something more substantial. It's sort of a story within a story - various visitors tell the cartographer monk various stories about the East, which is told via a monk's personal musing journal found by a journalist who translated the journal. This book is basically that journal. The author footnotes were interesting and as far as I can tell, factual. There is nothing much about cartography and the monk could have been living on any island anywhere. I was really hoping for more cartography or history. I would even have been happy with a mythology rich book, but this is so bland. Each "story" is less than a handful of pages.