Deep-Sea Research, 1977, Vol. 24. p. 1063. Pergamon Press. Printed in Great Britain.

BOOK REVIEWS

Estuarine chemistry, edited by J. D. BURTON and P. S. LISs, Academic Press, London, 1976, 229 pp. £8.00

THIS BOOK contains chapters by J. D. Burton on 'Basic Properties and Processes in Estuarine Chemistry' ; by S. R. Aston and R. Chester on 'Estuarine Sedimentary Processes'; by P. C. Head on 'Organic Processes in Estuaries'; by P. S. Liss on 'Conservative and Non-conservative Behaviour of Dissolved Constituents during Estuarine Mixing'; by A. J, deGroot, W. Salomons and E. Aitersma on 'Processes Affecting Heavy Metals in Estuarine Sediments' ; by E. K. Duursma on 'Radioactive Tracers in Estuarine Chemical Studies"; and by D. W. Mackay and T. M. Leatherland on 'Chemical Processes in an Estuary Receiving Major Inputs of Industrial and Domestic Wastes'.

The chapters are all well written and interesting to read. Good perspective is given on the limitations of the approaches and of the data available through 1974.

Most of the stress in this book is on nutrients and trace metals. Head's chapter on organic processes is almost solely concerned with total dissolved and particulate organic carbon, with no mention of any specific compounds or classes of organic compounds except for humic acids. Although our understanding of the processes affecting the concentrations and distributions of specific organic compounds in estuaries lags far behind our understanding of processes affecting nutrients and inorganic species, some limited data or specific classes of organic compounds in the coastal environment are available in the literature.

A better title for this book might he 'European Estuarine Chemistry'. Although references throughout the chapters are made to studies on U.S. estuaries, all the authors are Europeans, and naturally they stress the estuaries they are most familiar with. This is not all bad, because many of the data presented for the European estuaries were not readily available before. However, along with this book, one should also read the book entitled Marine Chemistry in the Coastal Environment, edited by T. M. Church and published by J. Wiley in 1975, to obtain a more complete picture of the state of research on U.S. estuaries. Reading both books would give one an excellent grasp of the material on this important subject.

RoY CARPENTER University of Washington, Department of Oceanoffr aph y W B- I O, Seattle WA 98195, U.S.A.

Ckeraktd ~ , 2nd edition, edited by J. P. RILEY and R. CHESTER, Academic Press, New York, 1976, Vol. 6, 414 pp. $30.65, £14.00.

Tms mJoK contains chapters by N. B. Price on 'Chemical Diagenesis in Sediments'; by E. Degens and K. Mopper on "Factors Controlling the Distribution and Early Diagenesis of Organic Material in Marine Sediments'; by F. T. Manheim on 'Interstitial Waters of Marine Sediments'; by S. E. Calvert on 'The Mineralogy and Geochemistry of Near-shore Sediments'; and by R. Chester and S. R. Aston on 'The Geochemistry of Deep-sea Sediments'.

All the chapters are thorough, well written, valuable reviews of most of the pertinent literature through 1974. Since all deal with chemical aspects of sediments, the volume is focussed much better than volumes 3 and 4 of this series. Marine geochemists certainly will find this volume extremely valuable.

The chapters by Price, Calvert, and Manheim are all comprehensive and leave the reader with a reasonable perspective on the current status of their subject matter. The chapter by Chester and Aston, although well written and thorough is considerably less current than the others. For example, in discussing silica in sediments, no mention is made of the important studies of Hurd (HURD, D.C. Geochemica et cosmochimica acta, 37, 2257-2282, 1973); and in discussing partitioning of trace elements in river borne solids delivered to the sea no mention is made of the studies of Gibbs (GraBs R. J. Science, Ig6, 71-73, 1973) on the partitioning of trace elements in Amazon and Yukon river suspended matter. Thus I found this review to be of lesser value than the others. The chapter by Degens and Mopper focusses largely on amino acids and sugars, and includes data on their distributions in sediments that I had not seen before. I was especially #eased they moved beyond total organic carbon and humic acids and considered some other classes of organic compounds.

ROY CARPENTER University of Washington, Department of Oceanoffr aphy WB-10, Seattle WA 98195, U.S.A.

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