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The math chapters in between chapters also serve as helful tools to refresh topics that students might have forgotten. This approach does not teach students how to tackle harder questions, but just put them into difficult situations when they try to do the problems themselves.
First of all, the book is very heavy on mathematical derivations, which is a great way to introduce the subject, but the author merely skips WAY TOO MANY IMPORTANT STEPS THAT HINDER THE STUDENTS' UNDERSTANDING and almost always say "By definition, the result is., and we know that", which make the learning process pretty frustrating. I used this book for two quarters of undergraduate physical chemistry course, and I have to say that this book is one of the most confusing pchem text out there.
The numerical analysis should be reserved in individual chapters instead of mixing in with the theoretical aspects.For the example problems, I think they are WAY TOO EASY compared to those of the end of the end of the chapter problems if you take a look into the solution manual. Thus, none of my chemistry professors do follow the approach of the book too exactly, and one of them even make his own notes instead of teaching from this book.
In addition, this book also brings in numerical approximation which is unnecessarily long and difficult to tie in with the analytical derivations in many of the chapters. One great part about this book is its comprehensiveness with 31 chapters,which triumphs over many other ones in the details provided and considerable depth.
If your professor is using this textbook, be prepared for long study-sessions, buy the solutions manual, and try to find a more undergraduate-friendly text.As a closing note, this text provides an extraordinary level of detail; those pursuing graduate degrees in Chemistry will likely hold on to it as an invaluable resource throughout their career. However, I am surprised that there are so few one-star reviews here, because the authors really haven't done first-time PChem students any favors.
Seeing the average rating, a neophyte PChem student might be left with the impression that this text is a student favorite, the "easy one" that undergrads turn to when their assigned text is too difficult to follow.This is not the case at all. It is replete with long, mathematical derivations, including a lot of calculus-based sleights of hand that, unfortunately, the authors either take for granted or bury in accompanying "mathchapters".
It is truly unfortunate that there are so many five-star reviews for this text. I cannot stress enough how important the solutions manual is if you're looking to understand the material and earn a passing grade.Make no mistake: this is not a one-star book.
There is no way to avoid the complexity of the math, but the authors could very easily have done a better job of explaining themselves along the way. This becomes particularly problematic when attempting to solve end-of-chapter problems on one's own; considering the solutions manual (sold separately) is quite often the only place where the nitty-gritty of problem solving is explained, you may actually learn more from it than from the primary text.
Those who do not purchase the solutions manual may find themselves having a one-star learning experience, and equally likely, stuck with a professor who cannot speak English well enough to fill in the gaps. Fortunately, what makes for a headache of an undergraduate text often makes for a highly valuable graduate text.
Poor job handling theories and background to various ideas. It's poorly formatted which leaves the reader at a disadvantage before even trying to study from it. I had the unfortunate experience of having to use this book. Bad diagrams (black and white), poor unit notation, and terrible sentence structure. Equations are derived for pages, however, the actual easily usable form of the equation is never hightlighted or boxed to direct your attention to the most important equation. The chapters on quantum chemistry and laughable. I feel like I'm reading something from the Enlightenment era where every sentence is three times longer than necessary. Don't buy this book unless you have no other options.
This book is totally awesome. If your math is weak, there are sections to review and explain what you might not know. we are currently using Atkins, which does not even compare to this book. This book has all the right information presented in a very clear manner. I have read this book for my class so far and have gotten better grades immediately. Physical chemistry is not an easy subject to understand, but with this book, its get a whole lot easier, and funner.
It's great. It's quite in depth, though you have to accept some parts of the math if you don't already know differential equations.It's understandable even to me, and the last chem course I took was just AP, but it's also very challenging and in depth. Highly recommend.
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