Rating: 
Summary: A superb book
Review: Analogy and explanation are Dr. Atkin's watchwords. Everybody will learn something from this book, no matter what level they are at. I have never seen a more entertaining description of the periodic table in a popular science book. Difficulties are turned to enlightenment. More please!
Rating: 
Summary: The Periodic Kingdom is an excellent book.
Review: As a pharmacist, I've taken years of advanced chemistry courses. I wish that I'd had this book (The Periodic Kingdom) available during pharmacy school- it would have helped to elucidate some of the most fundamental, yet hard-to-grasp concepts in chemistry. Right now, I'm using Professor Atkins' insightful illumination of the atomic world to help explain these concepts to my 6th-grade son. It beats the dry 6th-grade text any day. I can't praise this book enough.
Rating: 
Summary: Good idea gone too far
Review: For me, the analogies dominated over the chemistry I'm trying to learn, and after a while, I grew bored with visions of mountains, valleys, plateaus, shores, and seas. Yes, some patterns and relationships of the elements emerged, but this approach was not more appealing than the more straightforward approach of a good chemistry text.
Rating:
Summary: A pleasure to read. Very stimulating and inspirational.
Review: I am an outstanding reader. If I had tried, I could have read this entire book in one sitting. It is not a demanding text. After the first chapter, I didn't want to try to read it in one sitting because it is so well concieved and written. It was truly a pleasure to read.
This would be a great book to have on a long trip or a long hospitalization. The next time I read it I will have pen and paper at hand to keep track of the epiphanies it inspired.
Rating:
Summary: Water-Down Chemistry
Review: If you don't know a thing about science, particularly chemistry, or someone who prefers to read science in a casual approach, go for this book.If you're hard-score sciencist and especially a chemist, go ahead but don't expect this book to fulfill all your savors and wonders. I tend to agree on one of the previous review commenting on this book being a 6th grade reader - well, the point is, what's wrong with it being an easy and pleasurable reading? If Atkins gives a detailed, hard-core account of the periodic table in this book, the non-science folks will probably not even make to page 5! Less all the quantum mechanics, wave mechanics and Bohr model and electron spin.... This book certainly spices up readers' curiosity with interesting easy-to-relate analogies. For those who would like to read some chemistry on an airplane flying across the continent, this book will definitely not wear you out. Chemists, chemistry students and hard-core scientists...it's ok to take a break from all the obscure theories and amuse at Atkin's canny account of the periodic table that is so familiar to you.
Rating:
Summary: Water-Down Chemistry
Review: If you don't know a thing about science, particularly chemistry, or someone who prefers to read science in a casual approach, go for this book. If you're hard-score sciencist and especially a chemist, go ahead but don't expect this book to fulfill all your savors and wonders. I tend to agree on one of the previous review commenting on this book being a 6th grade reader - well, the point is, what's wrong with it being an easy and pleasurable reading? If Atkins gives a detailed, hard-core account of the periodic table in this book, the non-science folks will probably not even make to page 5! Less all the quantum mechanics, wave mechanics and Bohr model and electron spin.... This book certainly spices up readers' curiosity with interesting easy-to-relate analogies. For those who would like to read some chemistry on an airplane flying across the continent, this book will definitely not wear you out. Chemists, chemistry students and hard-core scientists...it's ok to take a break from all the obscure theories and amuse at Atkin's canny account of the periodic table that is so familiar to you.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent introductory book for children
Review: Ordered this book recently and thought that it was an excellent one. Yes, the constant analogies to landscapes will start to grate on an adult after a while and perhaps Dr. Atkins should have toned that down, but other than that I felt that the book was well organised and fundamental concepts introduced in a simple and physically intuitive manner. Prof. Atkins has a way with explaining concepts in a clear and logical fashion-his text book on quantum mechanics has been one of the best that I have read-and this book is yet another example. I think children in the middle-high school range will like this book. And for someone with a decent background in chemistry and physics, the book gives a wonderful view of the way Dr. Atkins has tried to see and understand atomic behavior.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent introductory book for children
Review: Ordered this book recently and thought that it was an excellent one. Yes, the constant analogies to landscapes will start to grate on an adult after a while and perhaps Dr. Atkins should have toned that down, but other than that I felt that the book was well organised and fundamental concepts introduced in a simple and physically intuitive manner. Prof. Atkins has a way with explaining concepts in a clear and logical fashion-his text book on quantum mechanics has been one of the best that I have read-and this book is yet another example. I think children in the middle-high school range will like this book. And for someone with a decent background in chemistry and physics, the book gives a wonderful view of the way Dr. Atkins has tried to see and understand atomic behavior.
Rating:
Summary: Good Primer On Chemistry
Review: P.W. Atkins' The Periodic Kingdom is an introduction to chemistry using the periodic table elements as a map to an imaginary land. If you like watching Doppler weather radar on the television news or reading charts in USA Today, you'll probably like Atkin's presentation; it's a visual book and shows the various connections among what might otherwise be unrelated graphs and charts. Why is the periodic table laid out in such a strange manner? Atkins takes you on a tour to get the "lay of the land" and teaches you some chemistry along the way. I took chemistry in high school and I wish I had this book then. If you learn through analogies, then this might be a good book for you. My only quarrel with the book is that there weren't enough examples and Atkins glosses over a few things that piqued my interest. Still, Atkins writes with graceful confidence, something you can do only if you know your subject.
Rating:
Summary: An excellent *popular* science book about chemistry.
Review: The previous reviewers split between two camps - those who think this book is oversimplified and those who like the book. The main point is that this is NOT an academic text book, so that somebody who studies chemistry academically wouldnt benefit much from it, but rather a popular science book, intended to present complicated material that should be accessable to everybody in a way understandable to the average Joe. That the explanations are simplified is the only solution, considering that the average Joe didnt study quantum mechanics. The book is not big, but it's supposed to be fun and easy to read, and it's price tag isnt big either. I like this book a lot - it presents the material in a readable and enjoyable way, making this basic science (and shouldnt everybody understand basic chemistry ?) accessable to everybody. Though I studied chemistry in high-school and a bit of inorganic chemistry in university, I enjoyed the way the presentation and got another angle on the subject.
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