Reddit mentions: The best crystallography chemistry books

The book I had was by a guy named Massa, it was pretty good. My experience was that the homework and exams were really not that bad, but what really needs to be learned was how to do refinement. Sometimes you'll do a structure refinement with really nice data and a great sample, and it'll be as easy as clicking a few buttons. But most of the time there's something else to be figured out before you get a good structure out, and you can really only learn it by doing it. I'm a physicist by trade though, so most of the theory used in crystallography was easy for me. There was a brief period of time when I slept with a few pages of all the Bravais lattices, point groups, and some space groups under my pillow to learn them, however =]

The experience is the only way to get better. Solve 100 structures and you have likely seen most of the pitfalls you will encounter in the future. For practical help see this book if using ShelXL, the author studied under Sheldrick. That book can help you with the commands that you need to do. I didn't ever have any luck finding good practical guides to crystallography. Message boards and forums are the best resources if you stuck on a problem, or network with some old-timers as a great resource.

The Shelxtl manual is helpful, but only to some extent.
I recommend this book by Peter Muller:
http://www.amazon.com/Crystal-Structure-Refinement-Crystallographers-Crystallography/dp/0198570767

The best way to learn about it, though, is to learn it from somebody else. That book will help, though.

I'm a little late here, but you should have a read of Klug & Alexander.

It's a pretty good overview of most things diffraction.

Cullity is also good.

Your library should have copies.

Hey. We can't approve this type of question. You could take it over to /r/statistics maybe.

A couple books I've looked at are Applied Bayesian Statistics and Doing Bayesian Data Analysis. Both are written at a pretty low level. The former kind of falls apart after the first few chapters, but the latter is pretty well respected (my university library had both online for free). Both cover the basics upfront but in different levels of detail. Some of the notations and derivations may be uncomfortable for you in some books (not seeing that you have taken a formal probability course and the types of distributions and procedures you use in Bayes aren't covered in intro-stats... beta, inverse gamma, MLE derivation...) so I'd try to look more at example heavy references. Be sure to specify whether you are looking for books or online references when you re-ask your question.

Here's another novel idea... Since you're talking about crystals and crystallography, just give the presentation on minerals, symmetry, and the differences in crystalline structures. Here's a great source... this was the textbook from my mineraology class. https://smile.amazon.com/Manual-Mineral-Science-22nd-Mineralogy/dp/0471251771/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&qid=1519408780&sr=8-8&keywords=mineralogy

Just make it a geochemistry presentation, it would be HILARIOUS.

Or make absurd claims about how alpha quartz, beta quartz, tridamyte, and cristoballite all have different healing properties due to different pressures/temperature of formation (Show the phase diagram from the book), and how the earth imbues different quartz species with magical powers based on geologic depth of burial. And then you could also talk about how different colors of quartz (Caused by chemical impurities) have different "powers" due to iron, chromium, and other chemicals present.

I'd be very interested to help you make up scientifically founded pseudo-science to make the whole thing look ridiculous through sattire... I have a degree in geology with a specialization in geochemistry, so I could help you make up some very sweet bullshit. Since any source you may cite is of questionable verifiability (Meaning not peer reviewed), to me it seems like you can use peer reviewed materials to come to questionable conclusions and still be in the right.

Or just say "___ is believed to be a healing crystal" and talk about the mineralogy and petrology of it and nothing else.

There are a lot of very crappy books about crystallography. Library loan before buying is recommended. My two personal favorites are Crystal Structure Analysis: Principles and Practice and Fundamentals of Crystallography. The former is a light, good introductory text whereas the latter is a slightly heavier read. :)

It's around the same price on Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Selected-Soldering-Brazing-Systems-Landolt-Barnstein/dp/3540257772/ref=tmm_hrd_title_0/176-3089559-6372012

https://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Crystallography-Dover-Books-Chemistry/dp/0486678393

https://www.amazon.co.uk/d/Books/X-Ray-Crystallography-2-e-Oxford-Chemistry-Primers/0198700970

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Crystal-Structure-Determination-Chemistry-Primers/dp/0198559011

Note: make a search before asking, this question has been already posted and answered in this sub in the past.

Bill Clegg's Oxford Primer:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/d/Books/X-Ray-Crystallography-2-e-Oxford-Chemistry-Primers/0198700970

This in comparison to other technology of its kind is way overpriced.