Complete Idiot's Guide to Chemistry (The Complete Idiot's Guide) [Paperback]

Ian Guch (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1592571018 | ISBN-13: 978-1592571017 | Publication Date: September 2, 2003

For high school and college students who must meet at least one chemistry requirement, this book offers a non-intimidating, easy-to-understand companion to their textbooks. Following a standard math-based chemistry curriculum, it covers:

€ Elements
€ The Periodic Table
€ Ionic and Covalent Compounds
€ Chemical Reactions
€ Acids and Bases
€ Electrochemistry, Organic and Nuclear Chemistry, Stoichiometry, and Thermodynamics

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Ian Guch has taught chemistry in both high school and college. He currently teaches at the Connelly School of the Holy Child in Potomac, Maryland.

Product Details

• Paperback: 400 pages
• Publisher: Alpha (September 2, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1592571018
• ISBN-13: 978-1592571017
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7.4 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (27 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #307,185 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

137 of 139 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars FINALLY a great Chemistry book!, May 2, 2004

By 

ScienceChick (Largo, Fl) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Complete Idiot's Guide to Chemistry (The Complete Idiot's Guide) (Paperback)

I'm on my knees thanking God for this book every night. I recently needed to brush up on my Chemistry. (I had Chem I in college.) I tried two other books before this one and they both sucked. The first one was Barron's Chemistry the Easy Way. HA! It was extremely confusing and poorly edited (wrong answers in the chapter tests). The second one was Chemistry Demystified and while it was much easier to follow, it also was poorly edited (lots of typos, mistakes, etc.)

After buying two really crappy books, I was ready to pull my hair out. But that's when I found The Complete Idiot's Guide to Chemistry. <insert Hallelujah Chorus here>

While I did have a Chemistry class in college, I struggled through most of it. And I am really bad at math. So words like factor-label conversion and significant figures sent me into a complete panic. But the way Mr. Guch writes is so easy to follow and so non-threatening! Not to mention funny! He tells you exactly what you need to know and exactly how to do the calculations you need to do.

I cannot tell you how much I absolutely love this book. I am THISCLOSE to randomly spreading these books around anywhere struggling chemistry students live. If you or your child is having trouble with Chemistry, PLEASE get this book. You will not be sorry.

35 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Fundementals in Plain English, June 24, 2007

By 

J. Umbach "zerrodefex" (Bartlett, IL United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Complete Idiot's Guide to Chemistry, 2nd Edition (Paperback)

Some people are totally missing the point of this book, like some of the negative reviews below. (Insult to your intelligence? If you're so smart you'd know that you're not the target audience of this book.) This book is for those who are either doing General Chem for the first time or coming back after a long hiatus.

The author provides the basic fundementals of general chemistry in a good plain english text that is meant to complement, not replace your textbook. This book gave me a great boost in Chem class when I used it that way, usually by reading this book first when a new topic came up so as to get a synopsis and then going to the textbook for the gory details. This book goes a long way towards making Chemistry less intimidating and soon that big course textbook is not so threatening anymore.

34 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Needs better editing, August 20, 2004

By 

JM "Geo-chick" (Spencer, MA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Complete Idiot's Guide to Chemistry (The Complete Idiot's Guide) (Paperback)

I haven't had any chemistry since high school and felt the need to bring myself up to date as painlessly as possible. Although I felt that the book was successful in helping me with this, I found too many errors in problem answers and examples. At first, I thought I was having difficulty understanding the concepts, but as I went further into the book, I began to trust myself more than what was written in the book if something didn't make sense. I also needed to buy a chemistry textbook to help me with some concepts because some explanations were vague.