book reviews lntroductlon to Organic Chemistry
William H. Brown, Beloit College. Willard Grant Press, Boston, 1975. xi 468 pp. Figs. and tables. 24 X 16.5 cm.
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This is a hook for nonmajars who are "preparing for careers in areas that require a grounding in the essentials of organic chemistry." As most one semester students of organic chemistry view it as more required than essential, their teacher requires a texthook which is short, readable, and exciting. Professor Brown's book meets these criteria rather well. In comparing the hook to most popular two semester texts, the only obvious omission is spectroscopy, a somewhat questionable choice in view of its increasing importance in the biomedical ares. With this exception, however, brevity has been achieved mainly by sacrifice of depth and detail rather than coverage. To provide excitement, the author has included a dozen "mini-essays,"' strategically placed throughout the text to show industrial or biological relevance of preceding textual material. Many biological examples also accompany reactions in the chapters. Roughly the first 10% of the book (two chapters) is given to bonding theory and its relationship to boiling point, solubility, acidity, and basicity. The discussion of atomic orbitals contains some inaccuracies (it is implied that the shape of an orbital is determined by the probability of finding an electron within it) hut this is standard for most organic textbooks. There is also an oversimplified rationale for the weakness of 0-0, N-N, etc. bonds (due to the presence of nonbonded pairs). For the most part, however, the theoretical treatment seems quite adequate for a one semester text. The first chapter also contains a table of the common functional groups along with specific e x a m ~ l e of s molecules containine each. .\ rhaptrr on alkanes and one t r n ~ n s d t l l rated hydromrboni fi,ll
