The illustrated novel is a tantalizing new form of modern literature, but Umberto Eco is actually “reinventing” old favorites. Children's books are always full of pictures, and these pictures illuminate children's imagination with a magical flame. This is exactly what the hero, second-hand bookstore Giambattista Bodoni from Milan, needs to return to his own self after a serious illness and memory loss. Magazines, comics, cool essays, speeches, advertisements, records, radio broadcasts. In the attic, as in a fairy-tale cave, the hero rediscovers well-forgotten, vital sensations. Reminding the hero of what he has experienced, meaningful smells and sounds are reborn from the magic of dusty pages. An old school notebook tells Giambattista about his old love and his youthful heroism. Having pieced himself together like a detective from a detective story, Bodoni regains self-awareness and returns from the imaginary and reconstructed world to the real one. How long? A new journey awaits him - the famous Italian novelist invites the reader into another clever phantasmagoria.