For those of you who teach parasitology at undergraduate or postgraduate levels, I would strongly recommend that you integrate this book within your taught curricula. It is excellent value for money and an inspiring treatise for it links several themes in modern biology as tailored within a parasitological framework. This dovetailing is very persuasive and it highlights both the cross-over as well as uniqueness of our discipline at a variety of levels. This perspective ranges from the small (e.g. cellular biology) to the large (e.g. field ecology) covering a lot of ground in between. Without prejudice, the book perfectly balances medical, veterinary and wildlife aspects giving a board vista on all the creatures that take advantage upon others. It does not shy away either from the global need to control parasites and their vectors.
From a publication point of view, the book is of outstanding quality with well-chosen images and graphics throughout, which really make the information, stand out and draw attention to important points. There is an associated online resource where the teacher and student can access bespoke resources that embellish the printed text, see www.garlandscience.com. There is, for example, a very useful tutorial on understanding phylogenetics with very precise terminologies presented in an easy to understand format. For those of you who would like to learn more about the topics covered, at the end of each chapter there are several review questions and an up-to-date reference list, broken down into leading concepts, that helps navigate the literature more succinctly.
Each of the 10 chapters opens with particularly pertinent quotes that set the scene for discussion. My overall favourite was ‘All living species are involved in parasitism, either as parasites or as hosts’ and I can think of none better if we wish to communicate the importance of our discipline to others. Fully appreciating the content within each chapter does require an advanced knowledge but at the end of the book there is Rogue's Gallery of Parasites organized in a traditional taxonomical appraisal. Here, students unfamiliar with parasites can quickly gain the essential knowledge of their lifecycles and associated diseases. There is a useful glossary from acetabula to zoonosis providing clarification when needed.
Highlights of the book include the excellent primer on the immunology of parasitism and Figure 9.1, a night soil collector in India going about his duties immersed in latrine sewage up to his neck. This image has stayed with me, not as a nightmare of an unfortunate's lifestyle for I have seen first-hand many others, but as an exemplar of the remarkable plasticity of human behaviour to endure daily, often intolerable conditions and with it, create novel epidemiological opportunities for parasite transmission. In my own field of schistosomiasis (of which the authors are leading experts), examples abound with fisherfolk and canal cleaners similarly predisposed to infection with high-risk occupational lifestyles, and schistosomes have done so well to exploit these opportunities.
To end, this book highlights the adaptive evolution of parasites beautifully and I congratulate the authors on such an impressive conceptual text.
