Since the appearance of "world history" as an academic subgenre in the 1990s, the Silk Road has received considerable attention. The causes behind this focus of scholarly attention are not difficult to understand. For those seeking an alternate interpretation of history from the idea of the "Rise of the West," the Silk Road offers endless areas to explore, both literally and figuratively. The concept of the "Silk Road" itself is an abstraction. There was never just one Silk Road. Rather, there were many smaller roads that, when viewed together, formed a network that facilitated the movement of not just goods but also ideas and techniques across Eurasia. The validity of the term "Silk Road" has been called into question, but Xin Wen's The King’s Road: Diplomacy and the Remaking of the Silk Road reaffirms the term's usefulness as a way of understanding an important theme of human history. This is a study of diplomatic relations in eastern Eurasia between 800 CE and 1100 CE based on the trove of documents discovered in Dunhuang, an oasis town in Gansu Providence, China, in the early 20th century.