When I was an undergraduate we used Atkins and Jones’ Chemical Principles: the Quest for Insight (link is to a slightly older edition because it’s not a field whose basic principles have changed much in the last few years). If memory serves, it was pretty good. I’d also recommend checking out the MIT OCW site for 5.112 (that course will do a better job of preparing you for organic chemistry than 3.091, which is more materials focused).
It is certainly possible to start with an organic chemistry textbook as long as you have a good grasp of some fundamentals (what a chemical bond is, ionic vs. covalent bonding, electronegativity, bond dissociation energies, etc.) so if organic is really what you’re after, feel free to give that a try. You can always pause that and go back to the general chemistry textbook if you feel like you’re lacking foundation.
If memory serves, the Best Textbooks list has Clayden et al, which is the one that all the UK universities seem to use. It’s a good textbook but if you’re looking for an alternative suggestion, I used and liked Wade. Again, I’ll put in a plug for OCW: 5.12 is the intro semester, with 5.13 following on.
Can I ask what the end goal for studying organic chemistry is? MCAT prep, learning biochemistry, and preparing to work in a synthesis lab all benefit from somewhat different approaches.
I want to learn biochemistry so I can reason about stuff that goes on in the body! I’ve started Lehninger’s Principles of Biochemistry and I mostly get it, but some of the stuff it assumes (e.g. covalent vs. noncovalent bonds) I’m not familiar with.
If covalent vs. noncovalent bonds are something you’re not familiar with, it sounds like you’d benefit from reading the chapter(s) on chemical bonding (every gen chem textbook should have one). I’d also infer from that that you won’t have much of a background in thermodynamics, which rears its head when you try to understand the energy-storing and energy-releasing reactions of metabolism.
That’s right, I don’t—I was talking to a friend about vaccines expiring and he said “things want to be in a low energy state”, which sounded like the kind of thing people say a lot and is probably right, but I didn’t, like, feel it.
When I was an undergraduate we used Atkins and Jones’ Chemical Principles: the Quest for Insight (link is to a slightly older edition because it’s not a field whose basic principles have changed much in the last few years). If memory serves, it was pretty good. I’d also recommend checking out the MIT OCW site for 5.112 (that course will do a better job of preparing you for organic chemistry than 3.091, which is more materials focused).
It is certainly possible to start with an organic chemistry textbook as long as you have a good grasp of some fundamentals (what a chemical bond is, ionic vs. covalent bonding, electronegativity, bond dissociation energies, etc.) so if organic is really what you’re after, feel free to give that a try. You can always pause that and go back to the general chemistry textbook if you feel like you’re lacking foundation.
If memory serves, the Best Textbooks list has Clayden et al, which is the one that all the UK universities seem to use. It’s a good textbook but if you’re looking for an alternative suggestion, I used and liked Wade. Again, I’ll put in a plug for OCW: 5.12 is the intro semester, with 5.13 following on.
Can I ask what the end goal for studying organic chemistry is? MCAT prep, learning biochemistry, and preparing to work in a synthesis lab all benefit from somewhat different approaches.
I want to learn biochemistry so I can reason about stuff that goes on in the body! I’ve started Lehninger’s Principles of Biochemistry and I mostly get it, but some of the stuff it assumes (e.g. covalent vs. noncovalent bonds) I’m not familiar with.
If covalent vs. noncovalent bonds are something you’re not familiar with, it sounds like you’d benefit from reading the chapter(s) on chemical bonding (every gen chem textbook should have one). I’d also infer from that that you won’t have much of a background in thermodynamics, which rears its head when you try to understand the energy-storing and energy-releasing reactions of metabolism.
That’s right, I don’t—I was talking to a friend about vaccines expiring and he said “things want to be in a low energy state”, which sounded like the kind of thing people say a lot and is probably right, but I didn’t, like, feel it.
Thanks for your recommendations!