The 11th edition of Farquharson’s continues to provide both the fundamental surgical skills needed by junior trainee surgeons, as well as the general surgical subspecialty knowledge necessary for higher surgical training. The topics cover the whole patient, with the concept that trainee surgeons need an overview, and all surgeons need to occasionally operate outside of their area of expertise. Although surgeons in training no longer anticipate that they will be expected to undertake unfamiliar operations without supervision, disease and injury do not respect specialty organ practice, especially in emergency surgery and trauma. With increasing specialisation, even experienced surgeons can sometimes be involved in a surgical emergency, or an intraoperative complication, requiring them to perform an operative procedure in a subspecialty other than their own. With this in mind, each of the specialist authors have focused their topic on principles for the general surgeon, and the editors have consolidated and adapted the information to bridge the gap between general and specialty surgery.