"Years of Rice and Salt" is an alternative historical novel by the outstanding American writer Kim Stanley Robinson. In this book, the author explores a world where the plague in Europe in the Middle Ages not only devastates European lands, but also deprives Europe of its influence on world events. In this alternative world, history develops without the involvement of Europe, and readers are invited to look at the development of civilizations in different parts of the world - from China and India to the Islamic Caliphate and Sierra Leone. The author takes readers through centuries and millennia, allowing them to see how history would have been changed if Europe had not been the center of world events. "Years of Rice and Salt" is a time travel novel that encourages readers to delve into the alternate reality visited by the author and consider the enormous impact that our location and cultural background have on the development of the world.