Calculus: A Complete Course (2nd Edition)

Rating:
Summary: Calculus: Lacking in Content
Review: After two full semesters with this book (and looking to start a third with it), I feel that the book is lacking in thoroughness and detail. This book is thinner than other calculus books I've seen, which may be appealing to calc I students but is detrimental for those going further. Some of the techniques shown in the book are very thorough and are described in a step-by-step manner. Other techniques are covered way too quickly in order for you to see exactly what is happening. The homework problems at the end of each section are too few to be of any real help. When you do a couple of problems and feel like you might know what is going on, they move on and give you problems that refer to another part of that section. I also bought the student solutions manual hoping that it would help unravel some of the mystery that is calculus. But again I was disappointed. The same lack of thoroughness pervades the manual; some answers are shown step-by-step while other answers skip steps, change forms, are worked and then changed back. Both the textbook and manual make assumptions about what the reader knows and/or how the reader might be trying to tackle the problem. If you have to use this book then I highly suggest getting REA'S Calculus Problem Solver. It was more helpful at times than the textbook!

Rating:
Summary: Calculus: Lacking in Content
Review: After two full semesters with this book (and looking to start a third with it), I feel that the book is lacking in thoroughness and detail. This book is thinner than other calculus books I've seen, which may be appealing to calc I students but is detrimental for those going further. Some of the techniques shown in the book are very thorough and are described in a step-by-step manner. Other techniques are covered way too quickly in order for you to see exactly what is happening. The homework problems at the end of each section are too few to be of any real help. When you do a couple of problems and feel like you might know what is going on, they move on and give you problems that refer to another part of that section. I also bought the student solutions manual hoping that it would help unravel some of the mystery that is calculus. But again I was disappointed. The same lack of thoroughness pervades the manual; some answers are shown step-by-step while other answers skip steps, change forms, are worked and then changed back. Both the textbook and manual make assumptions about what the reader knows and/or how the reader might be trying to tackle the problem. If you have to use this book then I highly suggest getting REA'S Calculus Problem Solver. It was more helpful at times than the textbook!

Rating:
Summary: Excellent Book
Review: I had the privilage of using this book for my calculus course as a senior in high school. I am now in college and very often refer back to this text because it is so comprehensively written. The book is easy to understand, but still covers a great deal of the very broad subject of CALCULUS!

Rating:
Summary: Calculus: Lacking in Content
Review: I have used this book for two semesters of calculus (and starting my third semester) and feel that it is sorely lacking in content! While the book is rather thin and therefore probably more appealling to the calculus I student, this will certainly lead to problems for those going further with this book. It is lacking in complete explanations of certain techniques. Although in all fairness it also does a good job of explaining other techniques. The homework problems at the end of each section are far too few to get a good feel for the technique being taught. After doing a couple of problems and getting a feel for what is happening, the book moves on to problems for another technique, leaving you wondering if you were doing it exactly right. The examples shown in the section to illustrate a technique can be confusing because they are not always shown in step-by-step form with the authors making assumptions about what the reader knows and/or how the reader would attack the problem. I used the student solutions manual to try to help unravel some of the mystery, but was also disappointed. It breaks down some of the answers completely so you can see what is happening and on other problems it again will skip steps and change the form of the answer making certain assumptions about how the reader is tackling the problem. If you have to use this book the I highly suggest getting the REA's Calculus Problem Solver to supplement the book. For some chapters it was more useful than the textbook!

Rating:
Summary: Not shaby
Review: It's actually a rather good book. My high school class just covered this book from top to bottom this year and has prepared us for the AP test quite well. The lowest score on our practice tests is a 4. The rest of the class get's 4's or 5's. Our teacher is good, admittedly, but the book has also been detrimental to our success.

The topics are logical and concise, though the book does sometimes wander on certain topics to unrelated applications and whatnot. Though not the most comprehensive, it is a good book.