The first edition in 1990 was part of a series of revision texts for the professional qualifying examinations of the College of Optometrists. However the author considered that its use as a text for undergraduate students was restricted by the lack of sufficient introductory information. This second edition has been revised and made more generally accessible by the inclusion of basic definitions and a 13-page glossary.

The book progresses from development, through motor and sensory anomalies to the investigation and management of heterophoria and heterotropia. The final chapters cover incomitancy, nystagmus and the effects of central lesions. The text concludes with advice about professional examination technique and summaries of 22 cases. The appendices include the glossary, a range of revision questions and a brief section on dyslexia.

The value of the book lies in the wealth of experience the author shares with the reader and the ingenuity and variety of the treatment strategies he has devised. Unfortunately in the theoretical aspects of the text there are an unacceptable number of factual errors. Many of these appear to be the casual slips, e.g. superior for inferior that any of us might make. However, the author might have reasonably expected the series editor to bring these inaccuracies to his attention before publication. A series editor is credited on the flyleaf.

An effective revision text for students must be free from errors. In its present state the book’s internal contradictions and factual errors are likely to reduce the student to confusion and despair. Regrettably this is most marked in the more complex topics where students are in special need of clear guidance.

To give some examples, the discussions of fixation disparity (pp 26 & 93) make it impossible to understand the distinction between fixation disparity and associated phoria. The reasonable definition of ARC (p223) is incompatible with the adjacent incorrect definition of the subjective angle. Neutral density is defined wrongly on three occasions (pp 39, 62, 80). Is an inferior oblique strengthened by advancement (p15)? Should we suspect Brown’s syndrome in any superior oblique under-action (p164)? When interpreting diplopia plots (p185) the more peripheral image does not always relate to the paretic eye but only when the subject is looking in the direction of maximum separation of the diplopic images.

Similar mistakes continue throughout the book and make it difficult to distinguish between thought provoking clinical data and errors. For example, central acuity falls off by one line/_ degree in normals (p49) and two lines/30 mins in strabismic amblyopia (p50). A Hess plot (p159) shows a left hypo deviation when fixing with the right eye and a right hypo deviation when fixing with the left eye. Some explanatory discussion in the text would be most helpful to the reader.

Yet so much of this book is excellent. It is packed with the knowledge hard won from years of clinical experience and this is just what students need. Unfortunately it cannot be recommended for students. Students are not in a position to discount factual errors and neither should they be expected to. This could have been such a good book and it is a real tragedy that no one read it critically before publication. Student readers might become angry about being misled but it is the author who should be most angry at the lack of support he has received from the editor and the publisher.