I had my choice of taking a pre-calc track college algebra course using this book, or another using a book by a guy named Sullivan. I'm the kind of geek who will investigate course textbooks before I waste my time signing up for a class, especially with challenging material, like pre-calc algebra. Or it's challenging to a former liberal arts major like me.Sullivan was dry, boring, confusing and seemed deliberately abstruse in presenting the material. If you take a course using his book, you were guaranteed to spend a lot of time falling asleep from reading his dry, boring material--when you weren't on Khan Academy, in math labs and with math tutors trying to understand anything at all about what he was covering. Did I mention that his book is dry and boring? It's so dry and boring that it almost made me hate math--and I'm a math major!Blitzer is more direct and explains things in simpler terms, with numerous step-by-step examples to help you pick up how things work. He has a Great Questions feature that frequently covers the "bottom line" about complex material that gets to the heart of things and provides effective short cuts to understanding concepts in a memorable way. He explains things so well that you can teach yourself with his book, and this is NOT easy material for self-study. Unless you're a math genius, you could never do that with Sullivan.If you have a choice, like I do, and you're worried about understanding precalculus, take the class that uses this book. You won't regret it.