book reviews Editor: W.
at the kind of introductory course it implies. The objection is simply phrased: "Too much." I am not convinced that freshmen need to know wave mechanics, steam-engine thermudynamirs, ligand field theory, or (of all usrless rhings'~nueleophilic ammatic substitution, in order to go on in biology, or geology, or maybe even in seeond-year chemistry. True, the instructor can suoolv his own emahasis. hut the temotsti&e;ists. with a 32 chantrr bwk, to parcel if out a chapter a week; and I can see only confusion resultinp: with a tent as stuned l'ull of mformat~onas thin one. That, however, is a criticism of freshman chemistry courses, not of this hook. As long as we persist in including the kitchen sink. this is an excellent text for a thorough course, and well worth your eonsidering for adoption. ~
F. KIEFFER
College of Woorter Woater, Ohio
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Chemistry
Doryle H. Buseh, Ohio State University; Ham'son Shull, Indiana University; and Robert T. Conley, Wright State University. Allyn and Bacon, Inc., Boston, 1973. 929 pp. Figs and tables. 26.5 X 20.5 em. $13.95 This is an introductory text for students in the sciences, and is complete enough to he used for a freshman honors course. Its language is strikingly clear and literate, without heing in any way "literary." The hmk is large-xer 900 pages, and about the size of a ream of typing paper. Printing quality is high and typography good, with supplementary material enclosed in lines and printed in a different face. Drawings are satisfactory. Liberal use is made of data in graphs or tables; these are well captioned and related ta the text. Nearly every chapter has a short hihliography; page and chapter references are seldom given, hut the selection is broad, including the Reinhold and Benjamin paperbacks, hardcover sources, articles from this Journal, and a few semiresearch reviews from Science. Each chapter has the usual exercises and problems, without answers. I find these a little slender, and would use a supplementary problems hmk; hut the major points are covered in the problems, and many instructors will find them adequate. Organization of material is standard, though its logic is made more explicit than usual. The text p m e e d s from particles (Chap. 1-I), through hulk matter (Chap. 8-17), to descriptive chemistry (Chap. 18-32). Thus the first seetian covers atomic and molecular structure; the second the usual stoiehiometry, gas laws, electrochemistry, solution chemistry, thermodynamics, ete.; and the third sectian-nearly
half the book-deals with "content subjects." This is quite the mast thorough treatment of descriptive chemistry that I have seen in an introductory text. The inorganic chapters relate all the empirical observations to electronic or thermodynamic properties, rather than presenting them piecemeal; the unusually long section on organic chemistry ends with chapters on natural products and biochemistry. "Chemistry" does not hesitate to use mathematics, hut it does not have the insistence of, say, Mahan's "University Chemistry" in this respect. In fact the authors have, by clever arrangement and typography, contrived to make the treatment appear Less mathematical than it actually is, which will doubtless he eomforting (if misleading) to students in the nonmathematical sciences. A few peculiarities should he noted. The authors have chosen to eliminate the usual appendices, spreading tables of AG,', E", K,, etc., through the text in the appropriate chapters. A large, thorough index (29 pages, about 5000 entries) allows retrieval with a minimum of pain; but two topics are seriously slighted which usually appear in appendices: chemical arithmetic and significant figures (problems are sloppy thmughout in this latter respect), and ionic compound nomenclature. Each of these is allotted less than a page of text. The organization of the hook, with the first quarter devoted to highly theoretical discussions of bonding and structure, makes it virtually impossible to coordinate lecture material with the laboratory. Fortunately Chap. 8 opens the second section with a treatment of gas laws which draws very little an the preceding seven chapters; some instructors may prefer to begin here. A more serious criticism can he directed, not so much a t "Chemistry," hut
- Reviewed in this Issue Doryle H. Braseh, Harrison Shull, and Robert T. Conley, Chemistry
. . A181
Robert T Morrison and Robert N. Boyd, Organic Chemistry, 3rd . . A181 Edition Murray Goodman and Frank Morehouse, Organic Molecules in Action
. . . A182
Lucy T. Pryde, Environmental Chemistry: An Introduction and Experiments in Chemistry (Laboratory Manual)
. . .A186
Clifford E. Swortz, Used Math for the First Two Years of College . . . A188 Science
J. Ramsey Bronk, Chemical Biology-An New Volumes in Continuing Series
Introduction to Biochemistry
. . A190 . . . A190
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Robert M . Hawthorne Jr. Purdue University North Central Campus Westville, Indiana 4639 1
Organic Chemistry, 3rd Edition
Robert T. Morrison and Robert N. Boyd, New York University. Allyn and Bacon, Ine., Boston, 1973. ix 1258 pp. Figs. and tables. 16.8 X 24.3 cm. $16.95.
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Writing a review of this particular text puts one in mind of an Anglican monk who is asked to criticize the King James version. The third edition is divided into three parts, Fundamentals, Special Topics, and Biomolecules. Part of this is organizational but same of it is new. There are more problems within the chapters and they are set off from the text material on a grey background, an attractive change. There are new chapters on earhanions, rearraneements and neiehhorine.... erouo efferts, n>olerularorhirnls and orbital symmerry, and h~ochemtcalprowsses. The third edit~onreflcct~to home cntcnt the increased interest in organic synthesis, particularly the role of the carhonyl group. In addition to a single chapter on aldehydes and ketones, there are two new chapters on carbanions as well as the old one on a, &unsaturated carhonyl compounds. The alkylation of oxazolines, the use of mereuration as a route to alcohols and ethers, and arganahoranes as sources of ketones and acids are among the new reactions discussed. Enamine chemistry gets three pages hut the .Robinson annelation is still buried in a problem. Organocopper reagents are utilized as coupling reagents though not in conjugate addition. Still missing is the Birch reduction. There is an abundance of problems and at least one of them was rewritten in a fit of delightful, slightly cynical whimsey, presumably generated some time in 1912 (prohlem 12, p. 881). The new chapter, Rearrangements and Neighharing Group Effects, has been
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(Continued onpage A182) Volume 51, Number 3, March 1974
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A181
book reviews worked out with unusual skill. Reactions like the Hafmann rearrangement are characterized as Sul-like while neighboring group effects and anchimeric assistance are compared to the familiar Su2 pathway. The approach is emminently sound and is supported by a large number of interesting problems. The chapter concludes with a consideration of classical versus nonclassical ions with only a bare hint of the large complementary changes in enthalpy and entropy engendered in that epic struggle. The new chapter Molecular Orbitals, Orbital Symmetry, is less successful. This chapter needs a clearer development of the relationship between atomic orbitals, linear combinations of these and molecular orbitals, along with appropriate problems. One of the great gifts of these authors is their ability to set out certain fundamental ideas, made simple by clarity of presentation, and then develope these ideas with shrewdly conceived discussions and problems. Fine examples were their development of carhonium ion chemistry in the first edition and nmr in the second. They have not done this for this topic. The material in the first seven pages does not prepare the student for the next fourteen which are concerned with Orbital Symmetry and the Chemical Reaction. This treatment of electrocvclic reactions.. cv. cloadditions, and sigmatropic rearrangements is very clear and is supported by a
A182
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Journal of Chemical Education
large number of problems, but the instructor will have a lot more explaining to do than is customary for this text. That is not all bad, given the distant clatter of thase computer terminals. The third section. Biomolecules, contains one new chapter. The first four chapters are devoted to fats, carhohydrates (21, and proteins. Those on carbohydrates and proteins are relatively minor modifications from earlier editions. The chapter on fats. formally a new chapter, contains the detergent oriented material of earlier editions with added paragraphs on phosphate esters and membranes. It is the last chapter, Biochemical Processes which justifies the establishment of Part 111. It is a stimulating introductory chapter. The careful discussion of chymotrypsin should convince the better student that enzymes are pretty clever organic chemists whose ways are slowly being understood. The same can he said for the discussions on biological oxidations of carbohydrates and the biosynthesis of fatty acids. Here these authors are a t their best, relating a limited numher of complex phenomena to earlier material, unruffled by the necessary omissions. Sheer momentum will guarantee that the new edition will he widely used. It is still one of the most hiehlv readable introductions t o organic chemistry and fully deserves the attention i t is bound toget.
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Manning A. Smith Buckneii University Lewisburg. Penna. 17837
Organic Molecules in Action
Murray Goodman and Frank Morehouse, both of the University of California, San Diego. Gordon and Breach Science Publishers, New York, 1973. vi 351 pp. Figs. and tables. 23.5 X 15.5 cm. $14.50.
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It is a pity that LLfe magazine is now defunct, for the authors of this book might have collected a fat fee far writing the slickly popular science articles which occasionally appeared there. Excepting one figure representing the human tongue, this is a pretty hook with a few beautiful color photographs, a few complex molecular diagrams, and a great many molecular formulas, colored red, which offsets them from the text and produces eye fatigue if they are studied in any detail. The author's apparent justification for this hook is a statement in the preface that they have encountered undergraduates that could "recall absolutely nothing from their organic chemistry studies shortly after completing their courses." If the authors expect to change this by presenting a few currently "relevant" subjects to nonchemistry majors with little or no previous formal training in basic concepts, it must surely be doomed to disastrous failure. The reason is simple; excepting an appendix with the formal title, "The Language of Organic Chemistry," (which is a greatly compressed version of (Continued onpngeA186)
