[TheUnfocusedOne]

Greetings,

Im a soon to be senior undergraduate chemist planning on attending graduate school for inorganic chemistry and im trying to pick up some books for my personal library to get a head start on reading up on some advance topics.

my gf recently picked me up a copy of cottons chemical applications of group theory, which im enjoying reading thus far, and it has really sparked my interest in obtaining more advance chemistry books.

A book that is hot on my list to pick up is Advance Inorganic Chemistry by Cotton and Wilkinson.  I was told this is that 'holy grail' of inorganic text book by my research advisor and as such (believing him blindly) im looking to pick up a copy for myself

my one question is,  which edition is considered to be the best?  ive read that the most recent (6th ed i think) is has removed many sections from the old editions and replaced them with new, less desirable chapters. this makes this edition less desirable than some of the previous editions.

so my question is, does anyone have an personal preference on what edition of this book is considered to be the best?

thanks in advance 

[Sam (NG)]

Usually, the most up to date information is best, I'm sure if you need to see an old edition afterwards, you can go and find one at your university library. Having said that, Cotton & Wilkinson contains a wide variety of subjects and if the new sections that have been added are completely irrelevant to your research, and the ones that were removed are intimately involved, then obviously you're going to have to make an informed decision as to which one to get.  Other than the major changes of new chapters, remember that new editions mean that more information has been found about the other topics covered by the book and possible corrections of errors.