This account of the heroic efforts to operate meaningfully within the deformed heart constitutes one of the greatest stories ever told. The surgeons were deemed psychopaths, the body count enormous. Yet with persistence and innovation those surgeons and their heart-lung machines ultimately triumphed. Professor Stephen Westaby trained with, then worked alongside, these pioneers on both sides of the Atlantic allowing him to write the most accurate, most exclusive, most insightful history of this taxing specialty.