Introducing the section on Samoa is a study of a Samoan girl, contemplative, beautiful in a Polynesian way, and with blossoms in her hair. The caption says, ‘Western Samoa stands out as something special; the women seem more beautiful, the hills greener, the villages more picturesque, and the lagoons bluer’. So James Siers' heart is captured, and he sets the scene for our visit to this gem of the Pacific. A brief history is given in the text, the social and economic atmosphere is touched on, and the remainder is material for the tourist. I felt the selection of photographs on this section was not truly representative, particularly in showing the Samoan himself, but sufficient were included to show something of the beauty and the wealth of colour of the Samoan islands, although none is included of Savai'i, more typical of the real Samoa, as it is more isolated. American Samoa is given another couple of pages of additional text, but the group of photographs portrays Samoa as an ethnic group. We now backtrack to the island kingdom of Tonga, shown generally in atlases as ‘The Friendly Islands’. Interest was created in this little-known kingdom off the main tourist and travel routes, by the person of its best-known sovereign, Queen Salote, who captured the hearts of the people of the world at the coronation of Queen Elizabeth. Several of the photographs are centred around her life, or her passing. With attention drawn to its existence, tourist promoters set about putting Tonga on the tourist map. So, apart from a little history, and a little economics, James Siers is concerned with telling us what we may see there. Due east now to the scattered Cook group; attention is concentrated mainly on the two islands of Rarotonga, port of call, and Aitutaki which was formerly the chief airstrip. With improved services, this paradise of the Pacific will tend to lose its isolation. For long the concern of the New Zealand Government, Cook Island industry, both primary and secondary, has been fostered, and the visitor to these islands is struck by the contrast between the primitive and the modern, more so here than in any other South Seas group. Next, to New Caledonia, not Polynesian, not even Melanesian, but included no doubt because of its inclusion in the Travel Centre's list of easily-accessible places to go to ‘get away from it all’. What struck the author was its individuality, and its difference from any other island group. French in atmosphere, cosmopolitan in its peoples, sophisticated in its standards for the European — James Siers sees New Caledonia as a place of contrasts. He illustrates this in the pictures he has chosen. The final port of call is Tahiti, largest of the Society Group. Here one will see what one expects of the South Seas — beautiful maidens in grass skirts performing hula dances, white sands and coral atolls, the colourful flowers, the tropical scene. All this is here — perhaps commercialized, perhaps over-presented. There is variety, too — one sees again the fish-drive, the native markets, the native villages, the blue lagoons. Some of the outer islands are accessible — Raiatea, spiritual centre of Polynesia; Bora Bora, made famous in film and story. The pictures show the beauty of the land. As Siers says, you must go to Tahiti to realize how good Gauguin really was. So our tour is complete. The book has presented what it said it would — Polynesia in Colour. Of the text, it is simple, in outline only. It does not pretend to give a studied treatise on each place visited. The pictures are all photographs — a little different from the clear, defined photographs of the travel brochure. I puzzled over them for a while. I did not think the colour printing process of the Kyodo Company of Tokyo could be to blame. Some of the prints, notably of flowers, but in some cases, of scenes, were true to life, but some had a colour-cast, while some were a little faded. I came to the conclusion that the photographer had chosen these on purpose; they gave an impression rather than a delineating picture, an impression of colour, the blues, the soft greens, the suffused orange. I could accept the pictures on these grounds. The scenes of N.W. Viti Levu were clear, much as a photograph would produce. This is the ‘dry’ area of Fiji. The lack of clarity of the other pictures could then portray the mistiness of the rain-soaked tropics. Some of the shots of people were perhaps too obviously posed. The volume will give the would-be traveller some idea of the countries so near at hand, and so worth visiting, while, for those who have already made the journey, it will provide a satisfying reminder of what must undoubtedly have been the experience of a life-time.