From the wild swings of the stock market to the online auctions of eBay to the unexpected twists of the world's post-Communist economies, markets have suddenly become quite visible. It is now questioned what makes these institutions work, how important they are and how we can improve them. This text takes the reader on a tour of a world we once took for granted, offering examples ranging from a camel trading fair in India to the 20 million dollar per day Aalsmeer flower market in the Netherlands to the global trade in AIDS drugs. Eschewing ideology, this text aims to show that markets are neither magical nor immoral. Rather, they are powerful if imperfect tools, the best we've found for improving our living standards.