Stein GS, Baserga R, Giordano A, et al, eds. (£45.50.) Wiley, 1998. ISBN 0 471 15706 6.

In recent years, there has been an explosion in the number of publications about the mechanisms that control the cell cycle and how their deregulation can lead to cellular atypia and potentially carcinogenesis. It has become increasingly hard to find review articles that are both up to date and that look at the cell cycle in its entirety. This book, we are delighted to say, attains these criteria. While it starts at the beginning of the study of the cell cycle and attributes important findings to leading investigators, it takes the reader on a journey through the controlling mechanisms of the cell cycle, gradually increasing the detail and amount of information in this very complex subject. Each chapter is written in such a way that it stands alone, providing a rounded review of the topic in question, and yet the chapters also roll together building upon each other.

The first few …