Crystal Engineering. A Textbook. By Gautam R. Desiraju, Jagadese J. Vittal and Arunachalam Ramanan. Pp. xiv+216. Singapore: World Scientific, 2011. Price (paperback) USD 49. ISBN-978 981 4366 86 1.

In this book, the wider implications of crystallography as something that goes beyond crystal structure determination are dealt with. Crystal engineering attempts to establish packing trends in whole families of compounds and seeks to establish connections between structure and function. As an appreciation of crystal structure is required to understand crystal engineering, some familiarity with X-ray crystallography, crystal structure analysis and data retrieval methods from databases is required. Also, access to the Cambridge Structural Database would be helpful when entering this subject. The book is divided into seven chapters as follows: 1, Crystal Engineering; 2, Intermolecular Interaction; 3, Crystal Design Strategies; 4, Crystallization and Crystal Growth; 5, Polymorphism; 6, Multi-component Crystals; 7, Coordination Polymers. The book ends with `Glossary', `Some Data on Crystallographic Space Groups', `List of Useful Web Sites', `Some Useful Educational References in Crystal Engineering' and `Index'. It is the first textbook in a fast-developing area at the level of undergraduates and beginning PhD students.