Mathematica: A Practical Approach (2nd Edition)

Rating:
Summary: Takes the first book and elevates learning of Mathematica
Review: Nancy and Colin have brought forward a Mathematica text of exceptional ease in learning. This text is current and has the same easy flow of information that has become the hallmark of this duo. It is well written for a self learning experience or can be adopted to a class setting. Of special note is the presentation of programming techniques, the book starts with the basics and continues to build the readers ability with Mathematica programming.

Rating:
Summary: The best Mathematica book I've seen
Review: The thing that makes this book great is that it lives up to its title and actually demonstrates practical approaches to using Mathematica. It covers the topics I've seen in other books and many that I haven't seen in other books like optimization and file IO.

This is the only Mathematica book I have seen with enough examples and depth to really show what Mathematica can do. The examples and quizzes are very clever and are a great reference to the subtle kind of tricks you can do to make your programs faster, cleaner, and smaller.

A selection of the diverse examples in the book: Chernoff Faces, Monte Carlo Simulations, Cryptography, 3D molecular-structure renderings, an Eliza program, and a discussion and comparison of functional, rule-based, and procedural programming styles.