Twelve chapters, which cover all aspects of the liver, address the important advances published from 1990 to 1992. The best chapters review a sharply limited number of articles, place them in clear perspective through extensive editorial comment, and frequently mention missing data. The chapters on acute and chronic hepatitis, portal hypertension, and cirrhosis are extremely valuable.

The book has been written to update clinicians on basic science, treatment, and diagnostic information. Most of the chapters accomplish this concisely, limiting discussion to a manageable (for both authors and readers) number of topics with significant advances. A chapter on hepatic and biliary tract imaging lists many studies using newer methods but does not place these methods in perspective or compare them with the methods they might replace. Editorial comments indicating the advantages of new (and usually much more costly) methods were remarkably lacking, and the chapter was therefore of limited value.

Although the book is readable, has a good index, and is reasonably short, the loss of nearly a year between preparation of the manuscripts and publication and the substantial variation in the quality of the presentations limits its usefulness. It is difficult to identify a group of readers who would be substantially helped by this text.