It is slowly dawning on me that there is a place for the e-book, which is fortunate as hard copies are becoming a rarity to review. One simply cannot read a textbook, cover to cover, off a monitor, whilst retaining healthy visual accommodation and sanity. Yet, I am beginning to accept that, for the reference book, where immediate access to a single chapter or topic is needed, there are advantages. One of these is the quality of the images in this book, so fundamental to what is indeed an operative guide, a surgical procedures manual. Allowing for my age, I kept magnifying the text and, only by chance, appreciated how the illustrations stood up to enlargement. I could keep on pressing the (+) button and see every vessel on the laryngeal mucosa without pixilation. I have no doubt that printed version of this book is of high quality, but the e-book must have the edge, if it is to be judged as an atlas.

The Foreword to this, the Second Edition, helps in telling us what is new, especially awake laryngeal surgery, gender affirmation and even surgery of swallowing disorders (with no fewer than five chapters on the last topic). The most appealing innovation is, however, the introduction of at least one ‘Commentary’ in each and every chapter. A second author will insert a paragraph or two, often presenting an alternative approach and occasionally proving unafraid to totally disagree with what is suggested. I found that to be a brilliant feature that ‘brings the text to life’ and I would love to see that more widespread.

There is little point in me reproducing a list of the chapter headings, other than to say that is truly is all there and not just the surgical approaches. Who would have imagined there were so many ways of moving an arytenoid, whether fixed or paralysed, whether medially or laterally?

I had thought this was strictly a US multi-authorship, but was glad to notice out own Guri Sandhu contributing, even if one of his qualifications is given as FRCS (ORL-HUS). I will tease him that the U stands for ‘Unnecessary’ when we next meet.

The e-book (and I hate to admit it) shows great artwork and photography. For ‘dipping into’ it is probably easier to manage than a paper version, with its search facility and it will be invaluable to anyone with any practice in laryngology. There is a chapter on the ergonomics of microlaryngeal surgery that stresses posture, chair height, armrests and surgeon comfort that could have saved me much backache and neck strain in my long career, had I known then what this told me.