A very important problem is tackled in this book, as the title suggests: the academic community should be confronted with all aspects of its misconduct, since it is a problem of such seriousness that it may cause a crisis on campus. If this is the message, the author must have very compelling reasons to support it. The author must also have the courage to describe the kinds of behavior that many people feel are unacceptable. The author faces a genre problem. The book definitely is not a textbook and probably was never intended as such. It may be difficult to describe it as a monograph, at least in the stricter sense of the hard sciences. On the other hand, describing it as a “handy guide,” as the author does, is too modest since the wealth of ideas presented and discussed, the depth of argumentation, and even the list of references, resemble much more a monograph than a guide book. Indeed, the book is devoted to a single theme, and the treatment might be considered sufficiently rigorous for the humanities, which is the author’s discipline anyway.

Decoo attempts to describe and discuss the various elements and forms of academic misconduct in a systematic manner. First, basic concepts are defined and the context of academic misconduct is introduced. In chapters 1 and 2, detection and analysis of alleged misconduct are handled. Next, assessment of the facts should follow in order to determine the extent to which they actually support the hypothesis of a possible academic misconduct. Various aspects of the assessment are discussed in chapter 4. Once the hypothesis is confirmed, the question arises as to whether or how to report it.

Handling of the case is the topic of chapter 5. Throughout the book, but perhaps especially in this chapter, Decoo presents various points of view with respect to the whistle-blower, the accused, the institution, and the individuals associated with them. Chapter 6 is quite naturally devoted to prevention, and many different approaches are discussed. The final chapter is a general conclusion, reviewing the core issues and formulating the final recommendations for all three principal kinds of stakeholders. In the appendix, a system to detect text plagiarism is described.

Decoo uses two cases of academic misconduct, which he was involved in as a reviewer, extensively throughout the book. Familiarity with inside details of the cases allows him to discuss many aspects of misconduct, while of course, preserving the confidentiality of all the persons involved. This discussion is definitely one of the positive aspects of the book.

The book has a brief table of contents, which includes only first-level chapter titles, omitting mention of subchapters. The list of references is comprehensive. The appendix is rather technical, describing a detection instrument for possible text plagiarism. The style and contents of the appendix differ from the rest of the book. The actual technical details of text comparison mechanisms and the program Cerberus that implements them are probably of limi ted interest for a majority of readers. The book as a whole, however, is a very useful reading for the general academic community.