I wholeheartedly recommend this elegantly presented paperback. The book opens with a beautifully concise and excellently illustrated synopsis of the structure and function of the brain and spinal cord, and continues with a clear and logical progression of short chapters through sections on neurophysiology and pharmacology before entering the clinical arena. The format makes it easy to find specific topics of interest. Each chapter ends with a useful list of key points and recommended further reading, and although the authors are drawn from America, Canada, Australia and the UK there is surprisingly little overlap of content, and a uniformity of style for which I congratulate the editors.

The clinical sections on neuroanaesthesia, neurointensive care, and monitoring maintain the approach of short specifically targeted chapters, and the book concludes with four briefly discussed clinical cases which nicely illustrate the clinical application of the principles of neuroanaesthesia. Throughout the book controversial issues are discussed with a balanced and informative style though occasionally an American perspective is evident. The sections on neurosurgical operative approaches and surgical positioning might be criticized for this, and for a more surgical than anaesthetic orientation but this is to look for fault in an otherwise excellent text.

Specific criticisms are few. A newcomer to the specialty may find that the diagrams and text on cerebral blood flow and its control lack clarity and detail. This is disappointing as in general the diagrams and illustration are superb. I found the description of magnetic resonance imaging sequences in Chapter 13 very difficult to follow, and would have preferred the authors to have given more detail on the difficulty of definitively ‘clearing’ a patient of suspected spinal injury. However this latter topic is succinctly addressed in Ian Calder's excellent chapter on airway management and cervical spine disease, and it is generally true to say that where I might be disappointed by an omission in one chapter I invariably found the topic amply covered elsewhere in the book.

Comprehensive yet concise ‘Essentials of Neuroanaesthesia and Neurointensive Care’ is an excellent book which should be a part of every anaesthetic department's library, and from which trainees in anaesthesia and intensive care will surely benefit.