The book is based on Tom Hamilton's University of Oxford doctoral dissertation. It deals with accounts written by the amateur historian Pierre L'Estoile (1546–1611), who is best known for his depiction of life in Paris during the French Wars of Religion. L'Estoile's preserved material consists of several diaries/journals, treatises, and miscellaneous writings that include both original pieces and copied material from other sources. While some were previously published, others are still not easily accessible. The author sets two goals: the first is to reassess L'Estoile's role as collector of histories in the historiography of the Wars of Religion. The second goal is to reconstruct L'Estoile's own personal world to discover the prism through which he, as a historian, viewed contemporary events. The underlying idea is that this reassessment will reshape researchers’ understanding of period. The book is divided into an introduction, a conclusion, and six chapters. Drawing on a large number of primary sources, which include not only those written by L'Estoile but also notary records, as well as secondary literature, Hamilton creates a well-researched study that deals with the personal collection of L'Estoile, which included books and other artifacts (chapter 1); a detailed account of the Palais de Justice where L'Estoile worked during his productive years (chapter 2); discussion of his personal life (chapter 3); and a discussion of three historical periods on which corresponding historical pieces were written by L'Estoile, but never published in his lifetime: the reign of Henry II (chapter 4), the Catholic League and Henri III (chapter 5), and, finally, Henry IV and L'Estoile's final years (chapter 6).

L'Estoile was born to a Catholic family, but his tutor was a Huguenot, the Genevan minister Matthieu Béroalde (d. 1576). It is likely that this early influence explains why the picture of L'Estoile that emerges from this book is of a man torn between his own religious background and the atrocities committed by his coreligionists against the Huguenots, many of whom were his personal friends. Perhaps the most interesting part of the discussion on L'Estoile's position as a collector of history is the network of informants that he possessed. Some of them were his colleagues at the Palais de Justice, where he worked; others, such as Claude de Marteau, were close friends or relatives both in Paris and outside, bringing him the latest news in person or by letters. Hamilton skillfully shows how ideas were exchanged in the form of books, pamphlets, or in person.

Hand in hand with discussions of a scientific character, Hamilton turns to L'Estoile's family life—portraying a rather idyllic picture of his relationship with his first wife, Anne de Baillon—and presents the masterfully researched financial aspects of his life. Based on L'Estoile's family book, the author also offers insight into the complex relationships with the broader family—his second wife, his mother, and also his son Louis, who ran away to join the forces of the league. Hamilton assures the reader that L'Estoile, though remaining in Paris during the rule of the league, was a Henry III and then Henry IV supporter, and this behavior of the son could have been interpreted as betrayal. While most of the secondary literature relates to Hamilton's argument, at times he employs secondary literature that concerns a different country, such as in cases of manuscript libels (110) or sodomy (112), where the references point to England and Switzerland rather than to France.

In conclusion, the book achieves its goal of positioning L'Estoile in his proper context and adds much relevant knowledge to our understanding of underlying currents in the Palais de Justice and in Paris in general. The reader will find many interesting and important sources on the Wars of Religion collected in one place, with new and important insights. This clearly opens new possibilities for studies of the period and in the study of early modern autobiographical writing.