Although at first sight this appears to be a short introduction to Anselm's life and legacy, it is in fact a more unusual book: an extended essay on Anselm's place among the saints and his life after death, especially in the light of his understanding of heaven. Ward addresses three main themes: Anselm's ideas of friendship, both on earth and with the saints in heaven, as reflected especially in his Prayers and meditations; his attitude to relics and their veneration; and his cult as expressed in accounts of his burial, his canonisation and relics. Anselm's theology and public life, if not entirely neglected, are subordinated to these themes. Ward argues that the Proslogion was not intended to prove anything, being rather ‘a prayer throughout, a prayer of desire and longing, in the best monastic tradition of longing’ (p. 25). When Anselm spoke to Lanfranc on the merits of St Alphege and other Anglo-Saxon saints he did so ‘purely as a theologian’, being concerned with the saints' friendship with God rather than respect for the English past and saintly relics (p. 58). This is a provocative book which draws on the author's deep knowledge of Anselm's prayers and the cult of the saints. Ward frequently points to the chasm between modern thought and that of Anselm and his contemporaries and she succeeds in narrowing that gap in modest way by taking what Anselm wrote at face value, and taking it seriously as such.