The most significant advances in cancer therapy in recent years have involved the development of systemic therapeutics. With improvements in response rates in solid tumors, opportunities have arisen to enhance the effectiveness of surgery. Administration of systemic therapy prior to surgery - neoadjuvant chemotherapy - represents one approach by which clinicians have successfully reduced the extent of surgery and, in some instances, positively impacted on clinical outcomes. This collection of works by expert clinicians from a variety of disciplines represents an exploration of the current knowledge of the role of neoadjuvant chemotherapy in diverse tumor types.