Rating: 
Summary: look elsewhere
Review: This text is ridiculous. It has been suggested by other reviewers that those who fail to understand this text simply can't grasp p-chem. After two semesters of p-chem, as a chem major, I have learned one thing: this book stinks. I suggest McQuarrie or Kauzmann.
Atkins reads as if it were written in German and translated by one of those pocket-translators for tourists. The organization is absurd: how they came up with the idea of separating the concepts from the mechanics of every major idea is beyond me. Why they separate the mathematical justifications from the discussion of the equations, I don't know.
the Advice: find another way to learn p-chem. ESPECIALLY if your professor stinks.
Rating:
Summary: A world of pain without reprieve!
Review: This book is the absolutely worst choice one could make for a physical chemistry course. Atkins's main selling point is: "By Jove, it's the 7th edition!" a whole generation of physical chemists has been trained to think that Atkins's is the only decent pchem text out there.The book is confused, muddy and arbitrary. Some concepts get great explanation. Many simple techniques have painstakingly done proofs and then the complicated techniques just get lots of hand-waving or worse...no explanation. If you interested in actually learning some pchem, buy Lionel Raff's new text from Prentice Hall (ISBN: 013027805X). Barring that, buy an advanced physical text in the subfield you specialize in, such as Carroll's Structures and Perspectives on Organic Chemstry. Whatever you do, don't buy this textbook!
Rating: 
Summary: Easy to read text
Review: Some people follow this text as if it were a cult book. I used it as a reference material (because I do not major in Chemistry) for a one-semester course. I enjoyed reading the book for it was simple and straightforward, not beating around the bush - quite the sort you love when the course is not going to help you further. An excellent book - easy to read.
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Summary: This Book Has Taken my Soul
Review: I pity the poor fools who are required to use this book. It is poorly written and chronically confusing. Words are arbitrarily put in bold type and then not defined in any manner whatsoever. Other words with lengthy definitions only merit italicized print, in some hierarchy of type that only the author understands. The "outline" system of organization inevitably bogs down into minor details that not only take pages to slog through, but do not reappear in any of the subsequent problems. And let's not forget the dreaded thermodynamics section in which enthalpy is defined only as an equation and not in any way that can be explained in real world terms. Finally, this book provides no decent review of most of the concepts it assumes readers already know. Either you need to keep your general chemistry text of choice handy, or suffer in silence.
Please do not go down the same path I did, it only leads to sorrow. Avoid this book at all costs.
Rating: 
Summary: Not For Learning on Your Own
Review: Without a decent this book is difficult to understand. The example problems in the book have nothing to do with the exercizes and problems given at the end of the chapters. I suppose it would be a good book if you have a teeacher that can fill in the things the book doesn't cover well it would be a good book. It is diffucult to learn from the book without additional resources.
Rating:
Summary: Undergrad in Chemistry Review
Review: God help the poor fools who use this book for an undergrauate physical chemistry course. The material in the book is is thermodynamics at its best, but for an undergrad, its too much. Many of the end of chapter problems are rigorous, and there are no helpful examples with in the chapter that will assist you. What the book doesn't mention is usually what is asked. Great for engineering students, but awful for undergrad chemistry students.
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Summary: A graduate Student in Chemical ENGR
Review: I really can not understand the poor reviews I have read about this book. It is very well organized and Atkins makes the concepts easy to understand. It is also fun and easy to read. For example Atkins explains various details that one would find other engineering or science books skip over assuming the reader is following and understanding the various leaps in logic taken during the explaination of the topic presented. I would also like to add that I am a normal student I do not learn things super fast or easily, so understand my review comes not form a genious, but a normal average Joe like yourself.
Rating:
Summary: Graduate student in Chemical ENGR
Review: Well thought out presentation of material. Easy to understand and easy and fun to read.
Rating: 
Summary: Just good or review
Review: This book is good for review, but it is not good for study because it does not explain very well. Instead, it tries to cover as much information about recent research topics as possible. I don't think it's necessary. However, it's a very good source to review for such tests as GRE, qualify exam.
Rating:
Summary: An unspeakable horror
Review: If there is ever a book that is worth burning, I would not hesitate to nominate Atkins's Physical Chemistry. This text is an absolute trash, considering its superficially laid out; excessively numerical end-chapter exercises. Nothing spells H-O-R-R-E-N-D-O-U-S better than this garbage. Reading Atkins's is equivalent to a vicarious torture of Nazi magnitude. While the slapshod mathematical treatment might be curiously amusing; the lack of precision and rigor is deeply offending. Apparently, Atkins was more concerned with his line art and numerical data than a little thought in his seemingly mysterious derivations. This book, enough said, is an unforgivable crime to humanity.
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