Michael F. Sturley, Fannie Coplin Chair in Law, University of Texas at Austin, Tomotaka Fujita, Professor of Law, Graduate Schools for Law and Politics, University of Tokyo, and Gertjan van der Ziel, Professor of Transportation Law Emeritus, Erasmus University Rotterdam. Sweet & Maxwell, London (2020) lviii and 409, plus 40 pp. Appendix and 8 pp. Index. Hardback £354.

It may be surprising that a book on the Rotterdam Rules1 has entered its second edition before the Rules themselves have entered into force. There are several explanations for this. The first is a technical one: since the first edition, the Rules have been amended, albeit in minor respects and following the procedure laid down in the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties 1968, Art.79(2), which is designed to allow for the correction of drafting errors. The second is more substantial: as different countries debate whether to adopt or ratify the Rules, questions have been raised as to how they would operate in different scenarios that were not considered in the first edition. The second edition seeks to remedy this, both by including explanations in the text and by adding illustrations, the number of which has almost doubled in this edition. The aim is to remove doubts in the minds of