Riotously funny, this early Carl Hiaasen novel has as its central character a venal, unscrupulous and blazingly incompetent cosmetic surgeon. Hiaasen's canvas is broad--really, the folly of civilization, with particular attention to the South Florida branch. And his palette includes oversize, outrageous behavior, fully two shades beyond reality. Every page made me roar with laughter as well as cringe for myself and my colleagues. Hiaasen makes us--plastic surgeons--remember what we are supposed to be and most particularly what we never want to become. The laugh is on all of us, both doctors and patients.

For a long time, Dr. Rees was among the best-known cosmetic surgeons in the world. Surrounded by all that implies, he combined his desire to do good with a love of Africa to launch the Flying Doctors of East Africa in 1957. This book is the story of how Rees helped begin this hands-on service, which now employs more than 600 people, most of them African. The organization has evacuated more than 50,000 emergency victims and performed an equal number of major operations. Dr. Rees, a man I count among my friends, offers a story that is both fascinating and inspiring. And it presents a view of the world of plastic surgery that is different from the one people usually see.

In 1994, Marcia Angell was the executive editor of the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine when it published a groundbreaking Mayo Clinic study disproving any connection between silicone breast implants and disease. But two years earlier, the FDA had banned the implants from the market amid dramatic claims that they were making women ill. The manufacturer was bankrupted by a $4.25 billion settlement. Emotion, greed and ignorance seemed to have swamped the evidence. Dr. Angell uses this episode and others to examine the often contentious relationship between scientific fact and the legal system, particularly when vast fortunes are at stake.

This collection of Roueche's articles from The New Yorker is a masterful display of scientific thinking and medical melodrama. Even the oldest entry, "Eleven Blue Men," which appeared in 1947, remains thrilling and alive in its classic depiction of medical epidemiology at work (the men in question all ate sodium nitrite that had been mistakenly used instead of salt in making oatmeal at a diner). Each story here conveys a lesson central to the work of any plastic surgeon or, of course, of any doctor--namely, the importance of actually listening to patients. The book is an inspiration to physicians and a treat for the general reader.

No, I have never read it cover to cover. Still, this book is always worth going back to. It inspires with its thoroughness and open-minded vision and with the way it helps us to understand the world. (And no, I do not want to get into the heated discussions about evolution swirling around us nearly 150 years later.) For the plastic surgeon, there is a simple lesson here, about cosmetic surgery and the survival of the fittest. The juxtaposition is not as far-fetched as it might seem. Two equally qualified people seek a position. The more attractive person usually prevails. Vital individuals at the top of their skills are perceived as ineffective because of signs of aging. Survival of the fittest on a micro-scale looms everywhere. Cosmetic surgery answers some of these needs. It is not the be-all and end-all, but in its proper place, and applied with common sense, it can enhance our lives.

Dr. Imber is a plastic surgeon in Manhattan and teaches at the Weill-Cornell Medical College. His newest book is "Absolute Beauty" (Morrow, 2005).

This is cache, read story here