How to do well in Orgo this summer session(6 weeks)?

[Outlanding]

Taking Orgo 1 and 2 this summer session? How to do well? It's 6 weeks for both course May-August.

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[Hospitalized]

Study a LOT. Get a whiteboard. Practice, practice, practice. Organic is not hard, it is time consuming. Dedicate yourself to doing well, don't be intimidated by anything you read. Plan to get an A and put in the work to do it. Utilize office hours if need be. A study group might help keep you motivated.

 

[Kochanie]

So I took the full year in 9 weeks (one quarter = 3 weeks). We had all exams on Fridays, so the key for us was to prestudy the hell out of the weekends for the next week. Basically what @Hospitalized said, just practice and do ALL problems.

 

[Outlanding]

So I took the full year in 9 weeks (one quarter = 3 weeks). We had all exams on Fridays, so the key for us was to prestudy the hell out of the weekends for the next week. Basically what @Hospitalized said, just practice and do ALL problems.

My professor is giving assigned problems. Should I still do all of the problems in the back?

 

[Karabo]

For orgo 1 (at least at my school), it was mostly just memorization (so using flash cards, etc are helpful) and being able to visualize a molecule in 3D. If you aren't good at this seeing the molecule in 3D and then figuring out its enantiomers, etc, then it will be helpful to get a model kit.

For orgo 2, you just need to be able to push electrons so you can figure out how you get from molecule A to molecule B. You'll get good at the mechanisms/reactions by doing as many problems as you can.

 

[Nucleophile1]

My professor is giving assigned problems. Should I still do all of the problems in the back?

Yes. Do every problem that you can get your hands on. Buy the book "Organic Chemistry as a Second Language". It is an absolute lifesaver in my opinion. When it comes to mechanisms, don't try and memorize every single one. Figure out the patterns and apply them.

 

[Kochanie]

My professor is giving assigned problems. Should I still do all of the problems in the back?

Yessss.

 

[ZymurgySurfer]

I found it helpful to write out every reaction on paper, then photocopy them with various aspects whited-out. Learn all the structures really well first with flashcards and make sure you understand why things act/bond the way they do. Once you get the hang of things it can be really helpful to find larger compounds from your book and write stepwise reactions of how you could synthesize them

 

[Outlanding]

How many hours are we looking at to devote to it each day and weekends?

 

[ZymurgySurfer]

How many hours are we looking at to devote to it each day and weekends?

Depends if you "get it" or not, some people have a really hard time grasping Orgo, others don't. I would say if you dedicate 40hrs/wk to Orgo- including class time- you'll do fine. If you find that you're doing well you could always taper off a bit. Personally I think spending any more time than that studying during undergrad means you aren't studying correctly

 

[JakeSill]

Depends if you "get it" or not, some people have a really hard time grasping Orgo, others don't. I would say if you dedicate 40hrs/wk to Orgo- including class time- you'll do fine. If you find that you're doing well you could always taper off a bit. Personally I think spending any more time than that studying during undergrad means you aren't studying correctly

40hrs/wk for 1 class is overkill.

 

[edgerock24]

1) Organic Chemistry as a Second Language

2) http://www.freelance-teacher.com/videos.htm#ORGANICCHEMISTRY

 

[ZymurgySurfer]

40hrs/wk for 1 class is overkill.

I agree, if we're talking about a normal semester long class. But this is condensing Orgo I and II into 6 weeks, at my university that would be 4hrs lecture/day which leaves 20hrs of studying, doing problem sets, etc.

 

[meander]

I looove condensed summer courses and I totally agree that 40 hours is appropriate. Treat acing orgo like a full time job -- put in a full day of work every weekday (lecture + top yourself up to 8 hours with studying, office hours, etc), a half day on the weekend, and take one day completely off. On a schedule like this with a summer course you can ace the class without ever studying at night, pulling an all nighter, ruining your weekend, etc.

Get Organic Chemistry as a Second Language and use it as a supplemental text for any Orgo I concepts that you're having trouble grasping. In my experience, Orgo I is all concepts, Orgo II is all applications of those concepts. If you grasp the concepts as you learn them in Orgo I, the second semester is mostly non-challenging memorization. If you memorize the concepts well enough to pass but never truly grasp them, Orgo II can become a nightmare.

 

[Outlanding]

I looove condensed summer courses and I totally agree that 40 hours is appropriate. Treat acing orgo like a full time job -- put in a full day of work every weekday (lecture + top yourself up to 8 hours with studying, office hours, etc), a half day on the weekend, and take one day completely off. On a schedule like this with a summer course you can ace the class without ever studying at night, pulling an all nighter, ruining your weekend, etc.

Get Organic Chemistry as a Second Language and use it as a supplemental text for any Orgo I concepts that you're having trouble grasping. In my experience, Orgo I is all concepts, Orgo II is all applications of those concepts. If you grasp the concepts as you learn them in Orgo I, the second semester is mostly non-challenging memorization. If you memorize the concepts well enough to pass but never truly grasp them, Orgo II can become a nightmare.

Ok do I bother reading the textbook chapter to chapter?

 

[meander]

Ok do I bother reading the textbook chapter to chapter?

Depends on the textbook and the professor.

 

[DrHart]

Ugh 6 weeks. I'll pray for you.

 

[Outlanding]

Depends on the textbook and the professor.

It's a huge textbook.

 

[toutou]

I looove condensed summer courses and I totally agree that 40 hours is appropriate. Treat acing orgo like a full time job -- put in a full day of work every weekday (lecture + top yourself up to 8 hours with studying, office hours, etc), a half day on the weekend, and take one day completely off. On a schedule like this with a summer course you can ace the class without ever studying at night, pulling an all nighter, ruining your weekend, etc.

Get Organic Chemistry as a Second Language and use it as a supplemental text for any Orgo I concepts that you're having trouble grasping. In my experience, Orgo I is all concepts, Orgo II is all applications of those concepts. If you grasp the concepts as you learn them in Orgo I, the second semester is mostly non-challenging memorization. If you memorize the concepts well enough to pass but never truly grasp them, Orgo II can become a nightmare.

Generally, there's truth to this. But for me it's the complete opposite. Orgo I did not make any sense and till this day I can't truly distinguish all the stereochem. I thought I was gonna struggle in orgo II but ended up clicking much easier for me and it made so much more sense than just looking at the structure on paper or even the models. The reactions were my favorite. My trick was learning all the different reagents and understand what they truly do. When I'm given the starting materials and end materials I just go through in my head what reagents are used to make that. Or if given the reagents and end product I just work backward. That to me was much easier than trying to figure diastereomer and enantiomer etc I hate stereo UGH!!!!

 

[GrapesofRath]

Many might disagree but my experience has been seeing the class by TAing for ochem that the summer sessions are definitely easier at my school. a) as much as no professor will admit it many just don't cover as much in the summer as they would in the year due to time constraints and at the very least while some might go through the same chapters, they won't go into as much depth and focus their tests as such. Just my experience TAing for a professor who does both summer and fall OCHEM teaching take it as you will b) the quality of competition is definitely lower in the summer. The class is full of students re-taking and many even on the re-take you'll be surprised by how their motivation still isn't great or that they still aren't putting enough time into the class. Tons of kids who retake C/D's still get B/C's on the retake in my experience. The students in your school who get 3.9+ GPAs and who ace their classes and ruin curves at the top don't often take summer classes, particularly ochem; they do research and things to benefit their application. I'll give an example; last year my professor taught OCHEM 2 in the spring and summer. One of his midterm exams was relatively similar and he re-used about 40-50% of the questions from spring to the summer(he didn't give out the spring midterm to the class). The average in the spring was a70%. In the summer: 54%. That's a major difference. On the same test in the summer a 73% which would have given you a C+ in the spring gave you an A- in the summer.

Doing well in a summer class, regardless of subject, is an issue of keeping up with the material. In a 6 week class my guess is it will be 2 midterms and a final. If there is a midterm every 2 weeks, you bet your ass you better not put off studying till 2-3 days before the exam like we all do more than we want to admit for our undergrad classes during the school year. From my experience OCHEM 1 is about getting your feet wet and getting used to ochem itself. Drawing the arrow pushing mechanisms, naming complex structures, understanding the real theory behind SN1/E1 SN2/E2. Stereo chemistry is another thing you have to conceptualize. How much time it takes to study and be able to learn the material in ochem 1 completely varies by person from my experience. A great way to check to see if you truly understand OCHEM is to gauge how well you do on mechanism problems in my opinion. I will say though towards the end of the semester you get a bit of a taste of what OCHEM-2 is like when you get tons of reactions thrown at you. Here it'll be things such as alkynes, HBO, dehydration, carbocation rearrangement, O3, H2/Pt etc. Here it is more about the reactions and knowing them than the theory behind them. A great thing about OCHEM-1 is that if you really do start to understand SN1/E1 SN2/E2 by the end of the semester as you learn and go through alot more different kids of reactions at the end of the summer the final is not bad at all and can really boost your grade from what I've seen. In other words if you understand the theory of Sn1/E1 SN2/E2 really well and learned all your reactions at the end of the semester(and learning those reactions will help you understand Sn/EN) I described above, there is not much more to study for the final.

The biggest key I can give to helping anybody in understanding organic chemistry is doing something incredibly simple; draw out all the partial negative and partial positives of a molecule in any reaction or mechanism. Negative attacks positive. That's all it is. You have to practice it to see it and understand it, practice it alot, but if you keep that basic principle and draw out electronegative and electropositive parts of a reagent there is nothing in OCHEM that can't be understood by that and that's the best way to go through any problem you are initially completely stuck on.

OCHEM 2 is interesting. The first 30% of the class where alot of focus is on benzene reactions honestly is about on par with the difficulty of OCHEM-1: know the reagents well, be good at synthesis, you'll be fine. The second third of the class is really the hardest part of any part of OCHEM when you deal with the Aldol Condensation, Robinson Annulation part of the course. Those reactions themselves take tons of practice and you really have to be able to conceptually understand them both for mechanism but also synthesis purposes(synthesis in OCHEM 2 is significantly harder than OCHEM1) but on top of that this is the part of the course where you get the most reactions thrown at you and alot of memorization is involved as well. At the same time, none of the reactions you memorize or practice in synthesis will click and flow together without conceptually understanding and without things flowing and clicking together, OCHEM 2 is rough. The last third of the course varies on professor; the typical organic reactions from here on out aren't too bad if you understood what you were doing in previous sections but it varies widely how much emphasis your teacher will place on some BIOCHEM here. I know some who in a regular semester spent 5-6 weeks teaching BIOCHEM related things and made the class very hard. I know others who really don't ask you to know anything other than what alpha and beta sugar configurations are and other very basic things like that. In the summer at our school, no professor teaches anything related to BIOCHEM which goes to my point that many summer professors won't teach as much as they do during the regular year.

There you have it, in the summer more so than ever when you have to learn more faster my general pro-tip is your professors and TA's are your best friends. Make use of them and make use of study groups.

 

[deleted577188]

Many might disagree but my experience has been seeing the class by TAing for ochem that the summer sessions are definitely easier at my school. a) as much as no professor will admit it many just don't cover as much in the summer as they would in the year due to time constraints and at the very least while some might go through the same chapters, they won't go into as much depth and focus their tests as such. Just my experience TAing for a professor who does both summer and fall OCHEM teaching take it as you will b) the quality of competition is definitely lower in the summer. The class is full of students re-taking and many even on the re-take you'll be surprised by how their motivation still isn't great or that they still aren't putting enough time into the class. Tons of kids who retake C/D's still get B/C's on the retake in my experience. The students in your school who get 3.9+ GPAs and who ace their classes and ruin curves at the top don't often take summer classes, particularly ochem; they do research and things to benefit their application. I'll give an example; last year my professor taught OCHEM 2 in the spring and summer. One of his midterm exams was relatively similar and he re-used about 40-50% of the questions from spring to the summer(he didn't give out the spring midterm to the class). The average in the spring was a70%. In the summer: 54%. That's a major difference. On the same test in the summer a 73% which would have given you a C+ in the spring gave you an A- in the summer.

Doing well in a summer class, regardless of subject, is an issue of keeping up with the material. In a 6 week class my guess is it will be 2 midterms and a final. If there is a midterm every 2 weeks, you bet your ass you better not put off studying till 2-3 days before the exam like we all do more than we want to admit for our undergrad classes during the school year. From my experience OCHEM 1 is about getting your feet wet and getting used to ochem itself. Drawing the arrow pushing mechanisms, naming complex structures, understanding the real theory behind SN1/E1 SN2/E2. Stereo chemistry is another thing you have to conceptualize. How much time it takes to study and be able to learn the material in ochem 1 completely varies by person from my experience. A great way to check to see if you truly understand OCHEM is to gauge how well you do on mechanism problems in my opinion. I will say though towards the end of the semester you get a bit of a taste of what OCHEM-2 is like when you get tons of reactions thrown at you. Here it'll be things such as alkynes, HBO, dehydration, carbocation rearrangement, O3, H2/Pt etc. Here it is more about the reactions and knowing them than the theory behind them. A great thing about OCHEM-1 is that if you really do start to understand SN1/E1 SN2/E2 by the end of the semester as you learn and go through alot more different kids of reactions at the end of the summer the final is not bad at all and can really boost your grade from what I've seen. In other words if you understand the theory of Sn1/E1 SN2/E2 really well and learned all your reactions at the end of the semester(and learning those reactions will help you understand Sn/EN) I described above, there is not much more to study for the final.

The biggest key I can give to helping anybody in understanding organic chemistry is doing something incredibly simple; draw out all the partial negative and partial positives of a molecule in any reaction or mechanism. Negative attacks positive. That's all it is. You have to practice it to see it and understand it, practice it alot, but if you keep that basic principle and draw out electronegative and electropositive parts of a reagent there is nothing in OCHEM that can't be understood by that and that's the best way to go through any problem you are initially completely stuck on.

OCHEM 2 is interesting. The first 30% of the class where alot of focus is on benzene reactions honestly is about on par with the difficulty of OCHEM-1: know the reagents well, be good at synthesis, you'll be fine. The second third of the class is really the hardest part of any part of OCHEM when you deal with the Aldol Condensation, Robinson Annulation part of the course. Those reactions themselves take tons of practice and you really have to be able to conceptually understand them both for mechanism but also synthesis purposes(synthesis in OCHEM 2 is significantly harder than OCHEM1) but on top of that this is the part of the course where you get the most reactions thrown at you and alot of memorization is involved as well. At the same time, none of the reactions you memorize or practice in synthesis will click and flow together without conceptually understanding and without things flowing and clicking together, OCHEM 2 is rough. The last third of the course varies on professor; the typical organic reactions from here on out aren't too bad if you understood what you were doing in previous sections but it varies widely how much emphasis your teacher will place on some BIOCHEM here. I know some who in a regular semester spent 5-6 weeks teaching BIOCHEM related things and made the class very hard. I know others who really don't ask you to know anything other than what alpha and beta sugar configurations are and other very basic things like that. In the summer at our school, no professor teaches anything related to BIOCHEM which goes to my point that many summer professors won't teach as much as they do during the regular year.

There you have it, in the summer more so than ever when you have to learn more faster my general pro-tip is your professors and TA's are your best friends. Make use of them and make use of study groups.

Right off the bat, I have to disagree. You absolutely CANNOT skip the first parts of O CHEM. That would be detrimental to one's understanding of the subject overall. I won't even continue reading your post.

 

[GrapesofRath]

Right off the bat, I have to disagree. You absolutely CANNOT skip the first parts of O CHEM. That would be detrimental to one's understanding of the subject overall. I won't even continue reading your post.

Where did I ever say the FIRST parts of ochem? come on dude.

 

[deleted577188]

Where did I ever say the FIRST parts of ochem? come on dude.

I mean O CHEM 1. Many of those concepts cannot be skipped without losing valuable info. Were you the same guy who said adcoms look down on pre-req courses taken during the summer?

 

[deleted577188]

Where did I ever say the FIRST parts of ochem? come on dude.

Yeah, it was you. Man, you really hate summer classes don't you??

 

[Lancer]

I mean O CHEM 1. Many of those concepts cannot be skipped without losing valuable info. Were you the same guy who said adcoms look down on pre-req courses taken during the summer?

It's my understanding that summer classes are generally easier than classes taken during the semester, and adcoms are aware of that

 

[deleted577188]

It's my understanding that summer classes are generally easier than classes taken during the semester, and adcoms are aware of that

This is your opinion, not a fact. I'm POSITIVE adcoms would not make this generalization. It is largely school based, and many times classes are harder because of the amount of information that has to be covered in such short time. I'm sure there are classes that are easier, but this is not always true. And I would say that more often than not, classes are harder (my opinion, of course).

 

[Lancer]

This is your opinion, not a fact. I'm POSITIVE adcoms would not make this generalization. It is largely school based, and many times classes are harder because of the amount of information that has to be covered in such short time. I'm sure there are classes that are easier, but this is not always true. And I would say that more often than not, classes are harder (my opinion, of course).

They are much faster paced, but you are only taking one class at a time, and the pool of students taking them is generally not as strong, as GrapesofRuth mentioned in his post. I know for certain that one of the adcoms here has previously mentioned that it is a red flag for an applicant to have many of their pre-reqs taken during the summer. Interpret that as you will.

 

[GrapesofRath]

Yeah, it was you. Man, you really hate summer classes don't you??

This discussion has already been had I'm not going to delve into it. 4 ADCOMS on the thread said they don't look down on summer classes, I'm willing to say I stand corrected, that's completely irrelevant to here slugger.

This is about what I've seen TAing for both summer and spring OCHEM. What are you basing anything you are saying off of? Like I said above I have first hand experience TAing for a professor who doesn't cover as much in the summer as the spring and in classes where class averages are well lower in the summer than spring on very similar tests. Nobody's saying this is the case for all summer classes, settle down ,but I have a pretty direct experience of a case where it is and know other teachers teaching ochem in my school where it is so take that as you will.

If you really want to delve into specifics you'll find its OCHEM 2 where there's alot more material which teachers in the summer are more likely to place less focus on (think the end of organic chemistry with malonic ester synthesis and biochemistry amongst others). With OCHEM 1 no one is saying a teacher isn't going to emphasize the key concepts like Sn1/E1, don't strawman. If you want something I've seen less focus in my experience given in the summer, it's things relating to stereo chemistry including things like Fischer Projections.

 

[deleted577188]

They are much faster paced, but you are only taking one class at a time, and the pool of students taking them is generally not as strong, as GrapesofRuth mentioned in his post. I know for certain that one of the adcoms here has previously mentioned that it is a red flag for an applicant to have many of their pre-reqs taken during the summer. Interpret that as you will.

I did not say take every pre-req during the summer. In fact, when @GrapesofRath and I had our debate in another thread, it was over whether adcoms would care if O CHEM was taken at the OP's original university during the summer. That is one class. However, I know many people who are taking full time schedules during the summer (and I go to a LARGE university, might I add).

The complete generalization that summer classes are easier is as stupid as saying that every CC offers easier classes than any university. It simply is not always true. I'm pretty sure adcoms don't give a **** if you took something over the summer or not.

 

[deleted577188]

This discussion has already been had I'm not going to delve into it. 4 ADCOMS on the thread said they don't look down on summer classes, I'm willing to say I stand corrected, that's completely irrelevant to here slugger.

This is about what I've seen TAing for both summer and spring OCHEM. What are you basing anything you are saying off of? Like I said above I have first hand experience TAing for a professor who doesn't cover as much in the summer as the spring and in classes where class averages are well lower in the summer than spring on very similar tests. Nobody's saying this is the case for all summer classes, settle down ,but I have a pretty direct experience of a case where it is and know other teachers teaching ochem in my school where it is so take that as you will.

If you really want to delve into specifics you'll find its OCHEM 2 where there's alot more material which teachers in the summer are more likely to place less focus on (think the end of organic chemistry with malonic ester synthesis and biochemistry amongst others). With OCHEM 1 no one is saying a teacher isn't going to emphasize the key concepts like Sn1/E1, don't strawman. If you want something I've seen less focus in my experience given in the summer, it's things relating to stereo chemistry including things like Fischer Projections.

Here's the problem: your college represents one of MANY universities that offer O CHEM during the summer. At my very large and respectable university, the summer courses are faster-paced versions of the normal fall/spring courses. Making the total generalization that they are always easier is false. I am set to TA O CHEM next semester as well, and I have very close relationships with the professors who decided who teaches what, and I know first hand that my university does NOT omit information for summer courses. Same with physics, anatomy, and even biochemistry.

Now, I can understand how some reactions would not be covered during the summer. Overall though, this is not the case at every school.

Man, you really hate summer classes lol. It's hilarious. Adcoms d0n't care when you take them, and many people want to get A's and know the information that is important for the MCAT, not become organic chemists or physicists, or biochemists.

 

[Lancer]

I did not say take every pre-req during the summer. In fact, when @GrapesofRath and I had our debate in another thread, it was over whether adcoms would care if O CHEM was taken at the OP's original university during the summer. That is one class. However, I know many people who are taking full time schedules during the summer (and I go to a LARGE university, might I add).

The complete generalization that summer classes are easier is as stupid as saying that every CC offers easier classes than any university. It simply is not always true. I'm pretty sure adcoms don't give a **** if you took something over the summer or not.

I should have been more specific with what I said. They may cover the same content as courses during the semester, but I said they are easier because students taking them over the summer are often only taking one course at a time with few other obligations as opposed to during the semester when they are taking a full courseload and also doing many ECs. It is debatable whether the courses themselves are easier/harder.

 

[GrapesofRath]

Here's the problem: your college represents one of MANY universities that offer O CHEM during the summer. At my very large and respectable university, the summer courses are faster-paced versions of the normal fall/spring courses. Making the total generalization that they are always easier is false. I am set to TA O CHEM next semester as well, and I have very close relationships with the professors who decided who teaches what, and I know first hand that my university does NOT omit information for summer courses. Same with physics, anatomy, and even biochemistry.

Now, I can understand how some reactions would not be covered during the summer. Overall though, this is not the case at every school.

Man, you really hate summer classes lol. It's hilarious. Adcoms d0n't care when you take them, and many people want to get A's and know the information that is important for the MCAT, not become organic chemists or physicists, or biochemists.

Let's just stop this argument before it delves into something stupid. No one's making total generalizations. I'm giving you a first hand experience of how when I TA'ed ochem in the summer was easier than it was in the spring. Not only that I gave everybody a bunch of specific reasons and examples of how that was the case in my experience actually TAing for the class. Anything else your saying about me, "like you must hate summer classes lol" is just you just making lazy generalizations. Look at my very first sentence "many might disagree but my experience has been that OCHEM in the summer is easier than the spring". That's it. If you disagree and see something different, fine, share it as you did. Period. End of Story.

As I said, many will disagree from their experiences, I'm just giving you mine as well as a bunch of advice on what the class was like to me and how I'd recommend you do well. If you really want me to be a perfectionist and to change many professors won't cover as much in the summer as they will in the spring to SOME, feel free, hopefully makes you sleep better. I'm removing myself from this before it delves into an incredibly pointless and asinine back and forth argument, cheers.

 

[deleted577188]

Let's just stop this argument before it delves into something stupid. No one's making total generalizations. I'm giving you a first hand experience of how when I TA'ed ochem in the summer was easier than it was in the spring. Not only that I gave everybody a bunch of specific reasons and examples of how that was the case in my experience actually TAing for the class. Anything else your saying about me, "like you must hate summer classes lol" is just you just making lazy generalizations. Look at my very first sentence "many might disagree but my experience has been that OCHEM in the summer is easier than the spring". That's it. If you disagree and see something different, fine, share it as you did. Period. End of Story.

As I said, many will disagree from their experiences, I'm just giving you mine as well as a bunch of advice on what the class was like to me and how I'd recommend you do well. If you really want me to be a perfectionist and to change many professors won't cover as much in the summer as they will in the spring to SOME, feel free, hopefully makes you sleep better. I'm removing myself from this before it delves into an incredibly pointless and asinine back and forth argument, cheers.

Good, we'll just agree to disagree. Cheers, and good luck to you!

 

[altblue]

I wouldn't count on the summer course being lighter. Even if it were, the curve would still be similar. Also, the kind of person to spend an entire summer taking organic chemistry is probably a bit smarter and disciplined than someone who wouldn't - I don't think you'll have an easier time.

 

[Styrene]

Just do 100% of the relevant problems in the textbook. Skip the irrelevant ones, and do some of the the somewhat relevant ones. That was my only study strategy for every class that utilized a problems-at-the-end-of-each-chapter textbook, and I always did well. The simpler the study strategy, the more time spent studying.

Hundreds of thousands of supplemental practice problems can also be found online.

 

[futuredoc331]

Took Orgo 1 and 2 during the summer. Each was a 4 week course. I studied just about all day for those 8 weeks and used Organic as a Second Language as my primary resource. Aced both classes and I give the credit to those books.