reviews General Chemistry, 2nd ed.
Answer given in the back: 14 x 10' m
F! W. Atkinsand J. A. Beran. W. H. Freeman: New York, NY, 1992. xviii + 1025 pp. Figs. and tables. 21 x 26.2 cm. $59.95.
General Chemistry has a clean, concise,andenjoyablestyle. The Case sidebars, new to this edition, touch an intriguing topics (Case in point: "Swimming Pools and Chemistty" and '"iving aboard the Space Shuttle"). Environmental issues are covered with a refreshingly gentle emphasis. Additional special-interest materials (such as scanning tunneling microscopy) are included in a box format, and historical tidbits are interwoven with the text. Figures are plentiful and effective, and the examples are numerous and appromiate. As far ar teachability is concerned, there are some strong points, such as an expanded semon un unit converriun and a math appendix rerrittrn to mludc calculators. The dlscussiun of some nonintuitive topics, such as colligative properties, is very good. However, the discussion of same other topics, such as oxidation numbers (which precedes electrochemistry by 13 chapters), could be improved. The authors elect to fallow the popular practice of extending VSEPR theory to organic molecules, asking students to treat triple bonds as a single electron pair, which I consider dangerously confusing. And although the authors lament that "many students have had little or no exposure to the scientific method", the" do not exoose them in this text. either. Thev discuss sirnificon; figure* bit fbster a casual attit"de toward h e m by v r a l k n g thrlr o w n rules, as in Exnmplr 5.11. I did not proofread the entire text but caught a few trivial typos, nonetheless. For instance, in Table 14.3 the hydroxide ion appears under the heading "acid". and the half-life for tritium is -eiven once as 12.5 days ( b i t later it is given correctly). There are also a few statements of ouestionahle accuracv , such as. "All metals can he ddormpd hy hlmmering . . . ",which dcfinitely discounts the difliculty encountered in hammering mer. cury I would hnvr rrarrnnged Jame mntrrinl ( r g , I would have introduced spectroscopyafter the hydrogen atom), but instructors can assign readings in any order they choose, so this is not an critical flaw. I t is more significant that I randomly selected two problems at the end of each chapter and found 27% contained errors. For example, ~
~
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". . .
B
B
Answer in the back: (a) is A2B,CD and (b) is AzBC2D;not an enantiometric pair. Problem 23.61 is misleading: "Writethe structural formula of. tene."
. . trans-1,2-diphenyl-2-bu-
These are not necessarily fatal flaws. A conscientious instructor would work through problems before assigning them anyway. But sometimes students do try problems an their awn, and students' confidence in themselves and the textbook can be a fragile thing. I f 1 were teaching from a different text, I would be tempted to borrow some explanations and visuals from this book. If I were teaching from this text, I would make good use ofthe Annotated Instructor's Version with its generous J. Chem. Educ. references, notes, and suggestions for demonstrations. I am afraid, however, I would have to ask the students to buy an additional, supplemental, problem book. Cathv Cobb
~~
Problem 15.69 is wrong: "Consider the two equilibria CaFz(s) r CaZ+(aq)+ 2Maq)K, = 4.0 x 10." F-(aq) + HzO(l)tt HF(oq) +OH-faq) KJHF) = 3.5 x lo-' determine the [combined] equilibrium constant." Answer given in the back:K = 1.4 x Problem 1.47 has a rounding error: "The speed of light is 2.998 x lo8 mls. How far can light travel in 5.0 s?"
.. .
Problem 21.59 contains an art error: do [the following1 form an enantiometric pair?"
Westinghouse Savannah ~ L eCo. r Aiken, SC 29808
Chemistry, Concepts and Models Wiam R. Robinson, Jerome D. Odom, and Henry 17Holtzdaw, Jr. D. C. Heath: Lexington, MA, 1992. xxi + 870 pp. Figs. and tables. 20.4 x 25.3 cm.
This textbook for the two-semester general chemistry course is a shorter version (750 pp of text) of the authors'Chemistry, 9th ed. (1005 pp of text). The publisher intends for this hook to meet the perceived demand for shorter texts. While the demand is justified, in the reviewer's opinion, just removing material from a long textbook, and that is mostly what has been done here, is not the best way to proceed. The condensation was achieved mostly by truncating discussions of molecular orbital theory, solubility products, and organic chemistry and eliminating a chapter on biochemistry.
The colorful and helpful graphics have been retained as well as a large number of problems. From 35 to 115 problems and many clearly worked examples are given per chapter. The use of the terms "concepts" and "models" in the title to characterize the approach of this textbook is not justified. Almost no effort is made to show haw and why current concepts were developed. Instead, every topic is treated as a matter of concise defmitions and a list of the rules by which the defmitions are to be used in solving problems. For example, oxidation numbers, like many terms, are defmed very early in the tbxt, with the rules far aseertaining them, hut with no demonstration of a need for them. As another example, the discussion of the periodic table begins with a treatment of electron canfirnation (su~posedhexplained in the previous chapter by a t ~ o - ~ adiscussia~af & & n i e spectra) without any indication in the begiming thbt the periodic table was a very useful concept long before anything was known about electron configurations. The first use of the periodic table discussed by the authors in variations in atomic radii, hardly the most importa n t use of the periodicity concept. Since the need for this and many other concepts and the relative mierits of competingconcepts is not shown, the student is left with no more reason to understand chemistry a s a science than is given by almost any other modem textbook. There is little about this book that provides coordination with the laboratory that is better than most other texts. The early treatment of &he common reactions (Chapter 2) and stoichiom& try (Chapter 3) is helpful, but the late discussion of gas laws (Chapter 10) and most descriptive chemistry (Chapters 13, 21, and 23) out of the total af 23 c h a ~ t e rdoes s not facilitate coordination
Don E. Gibbs Rockhurst College Kansas City, MO 64110
Volume 69 Number 10 October 1992
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