This is the first systematic commentary on the Rome Convention to be published in the United Kingdom since its entry into force by virtue of the Contracts (Applicable Law) Act 1990. The extensive annexes are alone valuable. They include the following: the text of the Contracts (Applicable Law) Act minus the Conventions and Protocol; the Convention, presented as three parallel texts in English, French and German; the Protocols on interpretation in the same trilingual form; various joint declarations on interpretation of the Convention; the Report on the Convention by Giuliano and Lagarde and the European Commission Opinion on the Convention; the Report on the Protocols by Tizzano; the Convention on the Accession of Greece; and a bibliography. It is extremely useful to have all these documents well-presented and collected together and in particular useful to have the trilingual presentation of the Convention. One could make a case for even more, but this would become cumbersome, and would no doubt stretch the linguistic resources of most British lawyers.

As for the text, an introductory part traces the history and sketches the context of the Convention and discusses its interpretation. Thereafter, the structure of the text shadows that of the Convention. The opening chapter on the context and origins of the Convention is excellent. Plender explains helpfully the place of the Convention in the Community legal order as well as its relationship to non-EEC Conventions, such as the Hague Convention on the Law Applicable to Contracts for the International Sale of Goods.

The rest of the text is primarily a commentary on the Convention. This is not purely descriptive, but identifies and explores some of the problems of interpretation which will have to be resolved. The book is written for English lawyers, but it is not insular in its approach. The Europeanization of large parts of conflict of laws requires that British lawyers take more account of developments in other jurisdictions in the form of judicial decisions and scholarly writings. It is perhaps a criticism of post-Dicey English conflict of laws that it has not been sufficiently European-oriented. Of course, notable exceptions come to mind, pre-eminently Kahn-Freund and Lipstein. But, as Kaye showed in his Civil Jurisdiction and Enforcement of Foreign Judgments, EEC Conventions are European texts, and our understanding of them is enriched by, and even requires, a European approach. It is a merit of this book that the author shows an awareness of writings of other European authors in French, German and Italian. In this context I was a little disappointed that there seemed to be relatively little to be learned from the experience of those countries which implemented the provisions of the Rome Convention before it came into force (Belgium, Denmark, Greece and Luxembourg).