This book is a response to those instructors who feel that calculus textbooks are too big. In writing the book James Stewart asked What is essential for a three-semester calculus course for scientists and engineers? Stewart's ESSENTIAL CALCULUS offers a concise approach to teaching calculus that focuses on major concepts and supports those concepts with precise definitions, patient explanations, and carefully graded problems. Essential Calculus is only 850 pages-two-thirds the size of Stewart's other calculus texts (CALCULUS, Fifth Edition and CALCULUS, EARLY TRANSCENDENTALS, Fifth Edition)-and yet it contains almost all of the same topics. The author achieved this relative brevity mainly by condensing the exposition and by putting some of the features on the website, www.StewartCalculus.com. Despite the reduced size of the book, there is still a modern Conceptual understanding and technology are not neglected, though they are not as prominent as in Stewart's other books. ESSENTIAL CALCULUS has been written with the same attention to detail, eye for innovation, and meticulous accuracy that have made Stewart's textbooks the best-selling calculus texts in the world.
Bought this for 2$ at a book sale and read it until the Integrals chapter before 12th grade. It was extremely fun to study and there were so many problems that the fundamental concepts would just get ingrained in you after solving them all. Got a grade of 98 and 96 in basic calculus in 12th grade since the lessons were just like a review. A simple to understand “essential” math book that I’ll definitely always reference back to in college. Again, there are so many problems in this book to solve to train you rigorously.
At times I loved this book, at times I hated it, but it has consumed my life for the past couple months. Overall, a good calculus text, but at times the organization and order of the chapters has seemed strange.
A fairly good textbook in the hands of a good instructor. It did unfortunately lack the integration of inverse trig functions in chapter 5, which was disappointing. I'd recommend it though to a student with a thorough instructor.