This eighth edition continues to present material in short chapters organized thematically into nine separate sections. Shorter chapters are less daunting and more 'digestible' for most students. Furthermore, they offer the professor a greater degree of flexibility so that the order in which chapters are covered can be tailored to meet the needs of an individual class.
This book went into way more depth than was necessary and actually ended up confusing me more than helping me. It’s okay, but it didn’t do what I needed it to, which is clarify concepts discussed in class and explain them in varied ways to ensure comprehension. It is very long winded when it doesn’t need to be.
The textbook itself is fine. It's a thorough and well done book for a college level intro to Microbiology.
However, if your class requires you to get an access code for McGraw-Hill Connect to use with this textbook, RUN AWAY! Take the class somewhere else and transfer it, try to find a teacher who uses a different textbook or try to wait it our until the textbook changes to something else. The customer service/tech support is NON-EXISITENT. It is obvious that you're talking to someone in some other country where people learn to speak English phonetically and they know NOTHING about TECH SUPPORT.
The only thing "tech support" knows how to do is to tell you that you must buy a NEW access code from the McGraw-Hill Website for almost $200.00 and they know how to tell you that your instructor did not set something up and they cannot help you.
I'm a nursing school student. If any of my nursing classes require McGraw-Hill Connect with any of their online classes, I'll be taking the exam option and do the home learning instead. NEVER, EVER trust McGraw-Hill Connect! They are a total ripoff. It was *I* who found missing code in the quizzes online. I was the one who passed the information to the instructor so she could tell HER tech support person about it and have it fixed.
If you only need the TEXT, fine but if you need the McGraw-Hill Connect access, RUN, RUN, RUN, RUN,RUN!!!!!!!!!!