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Review title: If you like to read calculator manuals page by page
Product review: If you like to read calculator books then by all means buy this book (all description, no explanation). Unlike "real" math books that promote a sense of learning by example and description. Van Loan's book presents nothing but a bunch of symbols with no explanation of where these symbols are coming from. The section on interpolation has all of 3 graphs showing the concepts he is emphasizing. Leaving the reader to solve for coefficients they really have no clue about until they refresh on the beginning of the chapter.The explanations are brief and the examples are not concrete. This is quite possibly the worst book I have encountered in my college career. But then again my University does not require linear algebra before the course that uses this book, and I'm sure that has something to do with my fustration with this text.
