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Chemistry Books for the Smart?
enzyme asks: "A couple of weeks back,
chrisd asked for
recommendations on computer books. This made we wonder: What are the great chemistry books? I want to know what books the chemistry geeks recommend! What are good books on chemistry - textbooks, popular science...whatever! Anything that an intelligent person without a PhD in chemistry can comprehend. What can I read to help me understand chemistry - my old chemistry textbooks don't really do this."
Assumming that you are also interested in computers (based on the fact that this is a Slashdot post):
"Computer Simulation of Liquids" by M. P. Allen, D. J. Tildesley (1997), Oxford University Press; ISBN: 0198553757
It is a bit tricky to get hold of because it is out of print, but it is the only undergraduate chemistry textbook worth its shelfspace.
With respect to understanding chemistry, what aspects interest you? Phys Chem, Organic, Bio, Inorganic, Theoretical? Understanding one won't necessarily help you understand the others. I've been studying chemistry for 10 years now, and I've given up trying to understand much of it...
I read these books as a 9 year old, did all the experiements, and to this day, I still find myself reciting basic principles from them to my colleagues in hospitals, molecular biology labs and other technical settings [a college degree in a related science doesn't fill in all the gaps of a practical understanding of the day-to-day world. An early exposure grounds you in the basics, and gets you seeing/thinking about things in chemical terms]
The Golden Book of Chemistry Experiments (Robert Brent, 1960) (not any of the many variant titles) is head and shoulders above any other chemistry book I'd give a bright grade schooler. I hunted down a copy for my own kids, and they loved it.
Chemical Magic (forgot the authors) is one of the best of the many "cool effects to impress your friends" books out there.
Add a good grounding in stoichiometry, energies, entropy, electronegativity, and a few other basic
things, and there's no telling how far it'll take them. I got thrown out of Chemistry in the first month of class (incompetent teacher wanted "her' answers on tests, not the correct ones) and took the Chemistry ACHs with no formal chemistry coursework. I got a 770 out of 800 (top 1%, beating all the advanced chem seniors at our school) and ended up placing out of a year of college chem, simply on the basis of having my eyes opened early. I ended up getting doctorates in Molecular Bio (which is largely chemistry) and Medicine, so those books must not have led me too far astray.
I'd recommend taking an intro chem class at a local junior college. Around here that costs less than a hundred bucks, plus the cost of books. This is important, because you need to learn basic skills that you don't get from reading more advanced (interesting) texts. Things like balancing chemical equations and stoichiometry are foundational and should not be glossed over. You'll also get a nice survey of the different parts of the field.
Taking a class also has another important benefit: access to a lab. Don't discount the value of hands on experience. Chemistry is a lab science and you should spend some time doing wet chemistry. Since most chemistry is too expensive to do at home (a poorly equipped home lab can cost thousands), this is a good cheap way to do it.
Next off, I'd recommend the Chemical Demonstrations series by Bassam Shakhashiri. I can only find the first one at amazon, but I think there are at least four. Most of the reactions that he gives are pretty entertaining and provide interesting ways to learn the concepts. If you can get the chance to do a few of the demos, go for it.
If you're still interested, I'd recommend taking an intro organic class, and whatever analytical chem you can find. The labs that go along with these classes are a blast and the content is more than worthwhile. At the JC level you've probably only blown a few hundred dollars on classes and books, and earned it all back in the time spend doing labs.
Once you've got the concepts down, the newsgroup sci.chem is pretty entertaining. Uncle Al is a kook who seems to a little about every facet of the field. At the very least, you'll get an idea of the real world problems that non academic lab chemists are working on.
By now you'll have found part of the field you enjoy. I liked analytical chem and spectrophotometry. Mainly because you can hack on equipment as well as chemicals. Try building some of your own lab equipment. Making a good balance is a challenge, building a homebrew spectrophotometer is a bit tougher. The amount you can learn from these projects is priceless. If that isn't your cup of tea, try doing simple chemical analysis around your home. pH is pretty easy to work with on a small scale, chlorine in the water might also be doable. Electroplating can also be fun. You'll need to buy some equipment, reagents and standards. Chemists have an old joke about analysis: You can have it cheap, fast and accurate. Pick any two. For messing around at home, start with cheap and prioritize the rest. Look for shortcuts and see how these shortcuts effect the outcome of you're experiment. The fun comes with the process, not the results.
At home I'd stay away from toxics and large quantities of flammable or corrosive materials. If you can't put it down the drain with copious amounts of water, chances are you don't want large quantities of it around. Strong acids and bases demand some respect, particularly HNO3. I got a nasty nitric acid burn in college and my skin was yellow and crusty for weeks. Nitric acid also produces 'smog' in many of it's reactions so ventilation is required. You'll learn the saftey stuff in class. Follow it wherever you are. I've worked in plating shops where acids where stored next to cyanide salts. Not good. Learn how not to kill yourself before working with anything that can kill you.
Chemistry is a bit like computer science. You can learn the theory from a book. Yet until you get your hands dirty and try to apply the principles you're learning, it's nothing but theory. I'm sure everyone else will have some good suggestions for books. My suggestion is to learn the basics in a classroom and practice them in a lab. Once you're there you'll find a wealth of interesting things to read. Get to the point where you know what you're doing, then start on your own projects. It's more fun to actually hack on the stuff than read about it.
I know its dated, but when I'm looking for some chemistry related reading I sometimes like to flip through Linus Pauling's book "General Chemistry." He wrote it with college freshmen in mind in many years ago, but its nice to pick up the Dover reprint and read the explanations straight from one of the giants of chemistry. Many times when my first college chem instructor was trying to explain something (and struggling at it), I'd look it up in Pauling's book to get another angle on it, which sometimes helped quite a bit. A good addition to scientific bookshelfs, especially for people interesting in the development and history of science, rather than just the current theory.
Don't blame me, I get all my opinions from my Ouija board.
Morrison and Boyd's "Organic Chemistry". Assumes you've had high school chemistry, but it's one of the most readable textbooks I've read on any subject. The material is developed in a logical and consistent order, with frequent recapitulations and an emphasis on pattern and underlying structure rather than factoids to be memorised.
The Extraordinary Chemistry of Ordinary Things,
Third Edition
Carl Snyder, University of Miami
0-471-17905-1; © 1998
see:
publisher's description
amazon.com's page with related items