The text I received was exactly what I ordered and in better condition than I expected... it was in perfect condition. This textbook saved me about 30% than if I had purchased it from my college bookstore USED and about 50% than if I had purchased it there NEW!!! Also, I received the book VERY FAST, within 3 or 4 days, and the shipping was free!

It never came in the mail. If it were more than $5.00 I wouldve complained but I just bought it from the bookstore for $80 instead.

Received the book quickly and the condition of the book was what it was described to be.

This review refers to the fourth edition of this book.
I bought this book at the Stanford University Bookstore as a reference text for quantitative analytical chemistry. Overall, I'd say it's an excellent book which covers all the fundamentals of the subject. It also contains a great deal of useful data. The editing is excellent (I didn't notice any typos) and so are the graphics (tables, charts, pictures).
Mind you, this subject is so big that only a small fraction can be covered even in a large tome like this. But the author has used the space available to him well.

I note that the reviewers who do not like this book seem to be students while those who love it are teachers or experienced engineers (like myself). I suppose that means that the author is assuming a certian level of knowledge on the part of his readers and is not spending a large amount of time explaining basic concepts.

So, you're considering either buying or adopting this text for intro analytical chemistry? Good choice!

This is the easiest, most straightforward, book on the market for students. It's been that way through many editions. It was a breath of fresh air (in comparison to Skoog) when it was first published.

Your other choices are "Fundamentals of Analytical Chemistry" by Skoog et al.(ISBN 0534417965) and "Analytical Chemistry" by Gary D. Christian (ISBN 0471214728).

Skoog is good it's just that he can't match Harris for clarity.

Christian doesn't change much. The end-of-chapter problems are usually just re-numbered. It's OK, though.

Fortunately, whichever you choose, none can be considered deficient.

One thing I don't like about these intro books: Why do they include all this instrumental analysis material? The instrumental analysis texts do a better job with these subjects anyway and all the extra chapters make the books needlessly heavy.

The intro books should just focus on basics like acid/base/complexometric/redox titrations, gravimetric analysis, sample prep., extractions, etc.

Harris (along with Bertolucci) has also written a true classic in the field of molecular spectroscopy: "Symmetry and Spectroscopy: An Introduction to Vibrational and Electronic Spectroscopy". Get that, too.

Check out my other reviews for other chem books

The explanations and reasoning behind doing certain procedures and calculations in this book is outstandingly good (most of the time). Each chapter provides detailed workthroughs of problems with easy to understand explanations and in a wide enough variety of ways for one to be able to do most of the problems in the back of the chapter without TOO much trouble. The life saver though is the separate optional solutions manual which provides ALL of the answers (even stepwise) to the chapter problems (GET THIS BOOK!). The chapters involving instrumental analysis could use some improvement in clarity, but the other chapters are very well written.

I just took a class that required this textbook, and I used the 6th edition instead of the 7th, and there was only one difference.... in the 6th edition, 2 topics were seperated into 2 different chapters, and in the 7th the two topics were combined into one chapter... If your a student and need this book for class, save yourself some money and buy the 6th edition. The word and homework problems are identical.

Item was delivered quickly and in very good condition. No problems were experienced. Good job and thanks.