Medical Care of Turtles and Tortoises Edited by Jan Hnizdo. Nikola Pantchev 600 pages, hardback, €128. Chimaira. 2011. ISBN 978 3 89973 493 5 THE editors describe this book's purpose to be ‘a thorough synopsis of the complexity of chelonian diseases’, but not a complete, all-encompassing reference, and I feel that on the whole their aim has been achieved. The book was originally written in Czech, later translated into German and then into English for this edition. As a result the text sometimes loses its flow, with frequent spelling or word errors and even some repetition of text. Further proofreading would have been advised. The writing is also sometimes ‘chatty’ rather than technical or scientific. However, this is a minor issue given the breadth of information …