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153 of 155 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Gem Quality; Finally The Whole Truth, August 30, 2003
By A Customer
Every book on gemstones contains much the same information. Physical properties, sources, lore and what the Greeks (Theophrastus) and the Romans (Pliny) had to say about the specific gemstone. If you are looking to find out how you judge gemstones, how you tell the difference between a fine sapphire and something mediocre, forget-about-it. Even the so-called "buyers guides" waffle around the subject. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, blah!, blah!, blah! I think if I hear that old saw one more time I'm going to spit up. Richard Wise tells the truth. Secrets Of The Gem Trade is the Bible! Straight non-technical talk! The first part of the book concentrates on principles of connoisseurship. The author tells you how to look at a stone, what the critera for evaluation is in faceted stones, cabochons, stars, catseyes, pearls and opals. this is stuff dealers never tell. He even tells you how to evaluate the light your using to look at the stone. Part II contains individual essays of about 40 of the most important gems. And oh the photographs: four of the world's most famous photographers, About 120 beautiful photographs including some of the world's most famous gemstones. True color! The Caplan Ruby, Rockefleller Sapphire, Hope, Hancock and Dresden Green Diamonds. This is the real stuff! Secrets Of The Gem Trade really does tell all. It is the first and only book that tells the whole truth and nothing but the truth. I read an excerpt in Colored Stone Magazine (they are excerpting it in every issue for a year) and couldn't believe it. The truth at last. I bought it! I love it!
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75 of 75 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The book I was searching for., June 24, 2005
In Secrets of the Gem Trade (The Connoisseur's Guide to Precious Gemstones) Richard Wise leads you through the swamps of the gem trade.
With an almost novelistic penmanship he teaches you how to judge and grade quality in gemstones while clearing some dogma's along the way.
Wether you like to know what the best colour is in Tanzanite, or how to grade a Diamond, you will find it in this book. No other book I read before dealt with this topic is such detail as Richard Wise's masterpiece.
He will not bore you with large tables of refractive indices, nor will he try to make a gemologist out of you.
What he will do is make you an expert on colorgrading and judging quality through good old and fun reading.
Not holding back he tells you the secrets of gemdealers and how to act as a pro in the field.
This book opened my eyes and titillated my senses to a degree that I wanted to catch a plane to Thailand and try it myself.
This extensive work is a must for every professional in the gemstone industry. It should be made mandantory reading for all jewelry appraisal courses and every selfrespecting gemologist should have this book on his desk, not on his shelf.
A. van Acker FGA
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54 of 57 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Missing lots of gemstones and other facts., March 6, 2007
The book is well designed, and beautifully written, and worth purchasing for a gemstone afficianado. However, I noticed several gemstones missing from the book. For example, when he's talking about the Garnet family, he doesn't mention demantoid, which although rare, is the most highly coveted member of this grouping. I'm not saying he has to add rare exotics, but there were some gemstones missing from chapters that were specific about a family of gems. Morganite (also popular these days) was missing from the Beryl group. In the sapphire section, he doesn't mention pink sapphire, but padparadscha (pink/orange sapphire) was there and he makes a tiny mention of pink sapphire in the ruby section. Pink sapphires are extrememly popular and I would have liked to see the specifics on those.
On the other hand, he did go into detail on fancy-colored diamonds and talked about every single solitary color that exists in nature. I'm really not sure how important that is because if you're using this book to purchase a gem, you're much more likely to get a pink sapphire than a natural blue diamond. However, I did enjoy the eye candy.
In each gemstone section he either added facts about the durability or he didn't cover it, so that was inconsistent.
I think he should revise this edition with coverage of more gemstones in the popular groupings like garnet, beryl, sapphire.
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