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Reviewer: Srini Ramaswamy

Felleisen's book is one of the few books that I have come across that uses a functional language for introducing students to programming concepts. Although I can be characterized as an instructor who advocates the use of imperative/object-oriented programming paradigm at the introductory level, I like this book. This book is well written; easy to read, and has plenty of examples along the way to prod the student into frequently practicing the skills they learn in the book. I also like the idea of introducing graphical elements into the learning exercises early in the book (chapter 6). The use of graphical elements, especially, helps negate some of the negative effects of using scheme. However, I am not a fan of using scheme as a first-level language, in spite of its simple and direct structure. I believe that students going out into the real-world need to be provided with skill sets that help them to compete successfully. While scheme may be a good learning tool at the introductory level, I have serious reservations about it preparing my students for competitive jobs. The book however, can be a good book for programming classes for Mathematics students; or as an introductory class for students at the graduate level who have little or no programming experience.