It could be somewhat hazardous to write about one's parasitological friends, much safer to focus on parasites and places, but Gerry Esch avoids risk of offence by his perpetual enthusiasm throughout the book. The content, as is made plain in the Preface and Prologue, is mostly derived from his own experiences. After the Prologue, that sets the scene, there are five essays, each focussed on field studies in one of the following: Lake Druzno, Poland; Slapton Ley, Devon; Charlie's Pond, North Carolina; Douglas Lake, Michigan; and Cedar Point, Colorado. The remaining three essays deal with the Canadian parasitologists; field parasitology in global assault on human parasite disease; and a concluding short discourse on where we are now, and where we are going. The first five essays are strongly linked to the respective locality, but with a number of themes within each, about history, personalities, research, or teaching, but related to field parasitology. The essays on the Canadians and human parasitic disease follow a different more impersonal style and, for that reason, are in some ways less inspiring. From the start the reader speedily becomes aware of Esch's ‘passion for field parasitology’.

In the Prologue Esch states that the book is not a historical or scientific tome, neither biographical nor autobiographical, although there are some elements of each within. He intends that the book contributes to a better understanding of fieldwork, providing insight into the aims of those who did it. Throughout, Esch is generous in his praise of what he regards as foundation investigations, for example, the studies of E. N. Pavlovski that emphasized the role of parasites and their hosts in biocoenoses, of landscape epidemiology that Pavlovski (incidentally, spelt as Pavlowski this time) and W. L. Wisniewski emphasized more than 50 years ago. Credit flows to Harry Crofton for his seminal papers on parasite population ecology, to John Holmes for his 1960's papers in Journal of Parasitology on interspecific competition between the acanthocephalan Moniliformis dubius and the cestode Hymenolepis diminuta, to Al Bush for his detailed analyses of enteric helminths of birds leading to guild structure, infracommunities, and to the notion of core and satellite species, in ecology formalised by Hanski, and applied in ecological parasitology by Bush and Holmes.

Esch accurately observes that many present-day biologists view natural history in a disdainful manner since it is not quantitative. He suggests, however, that the natural history approach has an important place in modern biology and parasitology because, for a parasitologist, the ultimate in natural history research is the elucidation of a parasite's life-cycle. In the essay on human parasites there is an example of the life-cycle of Capillaria philippinensis that serves to show the need for the parasitologist to ‘be ready for the improbable’.

Esch also expresses firm views about learning about parasites, and biology overall. The essay ‘A day in the life of a field parasitology student, “Janovy style” ’ describes the ideal of learning parasitology in the field. Correctly, Esch wishes students to have a strong sense that parasites are ubiquitous in nature, and to be found in almost every vertebrate and invertebrate animal. He draws attention to the trend in North America, also unfortunately prevalent elsewhere, for biochemistry or molecular biology to replace fundamental biology, seen by him as a great tragedy for beginning students who would be much better if first well grounded in the principles of general biology. While the future of research in field parasitology is seen as assured, Esch observes that teaching of field parasitology at biological stations in North America is at risk of disappearing. In the United Kingdom too, field biology is subject to progressive attrition, where even the teaching of parasitology in the universities is threatened by dilution within other currently more financially rewarding subject areas.

Esch concentrates on research in most of his essays. He draws attention to the fact that research can start rather by accident, as with Clive Kennedy's initial association with Slapton Ley, while he emphasizes the role of serendipity and the ‘stream of consciousness’ approach to research that gives exceptional freedom to follow a trail of discovery, and is the most fun. A need for long-term research is stressed, the problem being that without it not much can be concluded about cyclic events in ecosystems. The development of concepts and their harmonization with other subject areas are illustrated by his own transfer of ideas from the (then) rapidly developing field of aquatic biology to understanding the nature of host–parasite relationships within an ecological context, with the often fortuitous but mutualistic association of scientists at key times in their personal development.

The essay ‘From Elbing in Kansas, to Elblag in Poland’ focuses on W. L. Wisniewski who, according to Esch, undertook the first investigation on the relationship between eutrophication and parasitism. This is strictly incorrect, Wisniewski and his team undertook a quantitative survey of the parasite fauna of animals in a eutrophic habitat. With respect to Wisniewski's four overall conclusions, Esch agrees with three, but disagrees with the fourth, that in eutrophic bodies of water, particularly in shallow ones, the parasite fauna of birds prevails and is characteristic of them. Esch questions whether eutrophication is a necessary factor in creating a species-rich community of parasites, or birds, or invertebrates, or any other group of hosts, contending that Wisniewski was probably incorrect in this conclusion. In fact, Wisniewski was not concerned with the process of eutrophication, but rather the status quo in Lake Druzno. Both Wisniewski and Esch are probably correct, but each to their own, as they reflect different perspectives. Esch also notes that it was unfortunate that Wisniewski published his paper in a regional journal: in fact, Acta Parasitologica Polonica was the Polish national parasitology journal, now Acta Parasitologica. In any event, Wisniewski's article was abstracted in Helminthological Abstracts and elsewhere at the time.

The concluding essay ‘Where are we now, and where are we going?’, apart from the last paragraph, oddly only deals with parasitism as applied to humans. There are other important issues raised elsewhere in the book that deserve reiteration here. References, and Selected (Suggested in Prologue) Reading, conclude each essay. The Index has entries under main heads, e.g. acanthocephalans, Belews Lake, etc., not individually. Sometimes this makes finding particular items somewhat troublesome. There are 51 black and white figures, of parasites, people, and places, with three diagrams of lake profiles. The font is Lexicon, pleasing to read, and the paper is of good quality, with an agreeable feel and smell.

A few typographical errors were noted: in the text, for instance, sometimes Nickolas rather than Nicholas, and on p. 61 NERC is given as National Engineering Research Council rather than the correct Natural Environment Research Council. An inconsistency of spelling of Pavlovski was noted above. In the Index Polymorphus minitus appears instead of minutus, but overall there are few errors.

The book provides an attractive read, not only surveying interesting aspects of field parasitology, but also linking the studies to the people who and the places where they were carried out. For those who know the personalities involved, there are some fascinating facts. As Esch intended, this is an account mostly drawn from his personal experiences. The Publisher's statement on the rear cover ‘account of the development of an entire field of scientific endeavor’ is an overstatement: the book covers a significant facet of a multifaceted field, not the entirety of the field. For example, although E. N. Pavlovski is included, and V. A. Dogiel gets mention in essay 1, Russian parasitologists and their extensive studies in field parasitology are not otherwise included. There are other aspects of European and world field parasitology that would also have deserved inclusion if the book was an account of the development of the entire field of research. This book is, as accurately claimed by the author, a series of essays giving a personal perspective. It is stimulating throughout, exciting in places, thought-provoking, and with some fascinating insights. Recommended.