Gem Identification Made Easy by Antoinette Matlins, Antonio C. Bonanno (2003)

The whole experience of purchasing and receiving this book was easy. The book was brand new, still in shrink wrap. It was well below retail and it came so quick I was very surprised.

This book is good if you are planning on purchasing and setting up a lab of sorts to identify gemstones. It gives detailed instructions on how to use the equipment which is usually lacking when your purchase the actual equipment. Since I don't have much amassed yet (the tools aren't cheap) I have flipped through the book and put it aside for when I can get my collection of tools together. Great deal and will always be useful. Thanks for the excellent deal and service. My only complaint about the book is that there aren't a lot of good photos to use as a comparison for my unscientific gemstone identification.

I now have a growing gemstone collection and when I received some of these gemstones I had now idea what they were. I bought some testing equipment from China,since it was more cost effective. The using of these instruments has been made a lot easier with this book, also the results of these instruments is very well explained. Refractive index between toumaline and topaz overlaping and sometimes overlaping between toumaline and apatite, with a hugh difference in evaluation of gemstone at hand. I use this book as a primary reference point.

I really like this book because it has helped me set up my gem lab and helped me to understand what I have needed to get started in gem collecting. It has told me what I can get just as a minimum to get started and then what I can add as I progress in my collecting. It is a wonderful reference book for gems with the tables of information for indentification. This has been a valuable resource book.

I have so many cut and uncut gemstones that I have had for quite some time. Over the past several years there have been so many new gemstones and colors of the more well known stones. I bought this book so my identification skills are up to date. This book allows you to learn how to identify which gemstone you are looking at. By using the proper tools, this book describes exactly what to look for and what you should see to identify each type of stone as well as the quality and any type of treatments that may have been done. The color photos are very helpful. I highly recommend this book for anyone interested in gemstones.

I found this book to be very helpful as a beginner. Easy to read and well illustrated. A must for anyone interested in learning about gems and how to identify them.

This book was highly recommended on several interetsites about gemidentification!! .... So it was no question for a beginner of gem collecting what book to by. This got it all!
Dont have to say more - just by it. I have allready recomended the
book to others.

I love this book because I am a notice at gemstones and because I collect them. I bought this book along with a refractometer to study and learn all about gemstones so that when I sell them I will know what exactly I am talking about. I have learned a great deal in this book, in fact it is the best of all the books I have ever read. There is nothing I disliked about the book except I wish it were longer. Antoinette Matlins did a great job in writing this book, Antoinette makes learning fun. I would recommend this book above all others to anyone who is interested learning all about gemstones and then some.

The book was in great shape and the delivery was timely. I like the subject matter of book and was happy with packaging.

This book is advertised heavily on one of the jewelry channels as being the "best" I have only browsed thru it but think you have to have prior knowledge about gemstones before this book would be very useful to a novice collector of gemstones.