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well written popular history of the uses of furigana
This is a popular history of the uses and development of furigana through history. The first chapter is introductory, where the author shows some modern furigana uses to get over the idea that they are not purely a "here is the reading of this kanji" device. After that the book works forwards through history, showcasing various historical texts and discussing how they use furigana and what this can tell us about the Japanese language at that time. The book includes images of the texts it discusses.
Although the book itself is written in an easy to read style, the historical texts it works with and quotes are of course not so easy to understand. You don't need to actually be able to read the old texts fluently, but I think you'll get more out of the book if you're at a level where you can struggle through a sentence or two in an older writing style and have some idea about historical kana spellings; so I graded accordingly.
Overall I rated this three stars, meaning "recommended if the topic is something you're interested in".