<p>I was planning on using REA and PR for APUSH, and PR and Barron's for AP Chem. Are those the best combinations? Also, I have no idea what books to use for AP Calc AB -- any suggestions?</p>
<p>i'm in the same boat, so thanks for asking that question.</p>
<p>Admissionswhiz.com (currently offline for some reason, as of a week or two ago) had a great section on APs. He had stuff for the most commonly taken APs like bio, chem, calc (ab and bc), ap us, etc.</p>
<p>He said (the author of the site) that REA for AP US is amazing, and so i got it, and i can confirm its amazingness. i heard some chump call the descriptions "too in-depth" or something like that. well, personally, i don't find that to be the case. In addition to reading my textbook, I read the REA summaries the night before quizzes or tests and stuff to keep the myriad of facts intact and fresh in my head. But the hallmark of the REA book really is the vast collection of MCs. There are 6 TESTS in there! 80 MC questions per test. you do the math. blah * blah equals a hell of a lot of really good practice material when May comes around!</p>
<p>As for chemistry, I'm not too sure. I myself am actually in the search for some good literature for chem. i just did a search on amazon for the PR book and there are some very enthusiastically positive reviews on there. for AP Chem books, one guys even provided a mini summary of about 5 books out there for AP chem...</p>
<p>"Princeton Review
If you purchase only one review book, this is definately the one to get. This was the only one I really read through. The content was worthwhile, not too long, and fairly easy to read. I did most of the questions at the end of the chapters, but only took a quick look at the MC and Free Response questions at back of the book. I was a bit pressed for time. I finished reading the book the day right before the AP test. Really bad, I know. However, I had been preparing for a few weeks by doing old AP tests and tons and tons of old FR questions. I did almost all of the FR's on collegeboard' website. This book is definately not enough to get a 5, or even a four on. You should definately get a hold of old tests and do them! Also, try to keep up with the text book during the year to make sure you at least have some idea of what's going on. With that said, I can add one more high point of this book... the REACTIONS SECTION. The best I've seen. Very thorough, and much better than the other books. There are a few more rules than those in the books though, so make sure you ask a teacher or do enough to recognize patterns.</p>
<p>Barrons
This is definately one of the worse ones out of the lot. (Second worse.) I had read AP Euro review books before(since the test was a few days before) and was in the process of reading Princeton's chem book. How is this relavent you ask? Well, I've heard that some review books are notorious for huge, massive errors. I had personally never experienced this before and didn't notice any in the ones I had already read. Then there was the Barron's book. I looked at a few pages, and knew this was not worth the time. Specifically, I looked at the reactions questions at the end of the book. Some of the answers were WRONG! Very discouraging and wasted my time. Don't even bother with this book.</p>
<p>REA
The absolute worst one out of all of them. A friend lent this to me since she had it laying around. Please note that this book was from a couple years back (though review books don't change too much). I read about 1/4 of the book. Waste of time. Hard to read, wierd diagrams, doesn't contain what's need for the test. Really makes me leary from buying more of their review books in the future.</p>
<p>Kaplan
One of the better ones. The periodicity section in particular stands out. It was well written. I did not read this as I had absolutely no time, but it looks like a good, reliable, review. Seems a lot thicker than Princeton's, but would probably be more thorough. The reactions section though is definately inferrior.
This would be a good backup/ supplement to Princeton's version. Now I wish I did not procrastinate and instead spent time reading Kaplan's review."</p>
<p>and for AP calc, a bunch of my friends used barron's last year and pretty much all of them got 5's.</p>
<p>-will</p>
<p>and by the way, the quote was taken from Amazon.com</p>
<p>just the review: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/A2SBDU9YDWWJTK/ref=cm_cr_auth/103-8615057-1098210?%5Fencoding=UTF8%5B/url%5D">http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/A2SBDU9YDWWJTK/ref=cm_cr_auth/103-8615057-1098210?%5Fencoding=UTF8</a></p>
<p>amazon's page for the PR book on AP Chem: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0375763821/103-8615057-1098210?v=glance&n=283155%5B/url%5D">http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0375763821/103-8615057-1098210?v=glance&n=283155</a></p>
<p>WOW. Thanks SO much for taking the time to find all that info. I really appreciate it. =]</p>
<p>haha no prob : )</p>