make up this volume, the remainder being from Britain, Germany, and the USA.
This book certainly cannot be regarded as giving a balanced account of eukaryotic chromosomes. More than half of it is concerned with various aspects of chromosome aberrations: methods of study. agents inducing aberrations, their occurrence in neoplasm and genetic diseases and so on. The first two-fifths of thc book covers a much more diverse and, indeed, esoteric range of topics, from DNA systematics to cytogenetics of farm animals, and from centromere separation to studies of mosquito chromosomes. Important and interesting though many of these topics may be, there is really very little coherence in the plan of this book, and its subtitle 'Structural and Functional Aspects'. is perhaps even more misleading than its main title.
The reader of this review may perhaps wonder whether there might not be at lcast one chapter that stands out as being a valuable and original review of its field. Alas, there was none. Several chapters are sound reviews, but merely seem to repeat what has already been published elsewhere; others are so short as to suggest a reluctance by the authors to contribute anything at all, while at the other extreme a chapter on mosquitoes extends to nearly 15% of the book, a disproportionate amount by any standard. It is not easy to produce a good, multi-author volume on a clearly defined subject, and it requires careful planning and discerning editors to make a success of such a venture. Thc Festschrift, which rarely has a clearly defined subject, is a much more difficult enterprise, and this one has, regrettably, failed. Editors and publishers should make their aims much more clearly defined before starting on a project of this sort. To potential purchasers I can only say, do not buy this book.