The author provides a wealth of information for the public, on types and colors of faceted stones, and some other materials found in jewelry stores, such as jade, pearls, agate and some other carvings.

The table of contents and very god index allows the reader to find a particular interest.
There is a lot of color photographs by contributors. This is very good since the gems come in many colors and the color plays an important role in value and in identification.

The discussion on the "four Cs" is very good and covered in detail for each gem mineral.
Occurrences of each color of each mineral are usually covered by locality and quality and sometimes history.mentioned .

This is the 3rd edition of the book. The author has kept the book up to date since 1998. This is the 2016 version.

The author coves details of each mineral and cut stone including imperfections, unique colors, zoning, fracture prevalence, imitations, synthetic versions, heat and radiation treating, and wear-ability in jewelry.

There are tables in the back listing the minerals' various properties such as refractive index, dispersion, specific gravity, hardness, and the type of treating if any to expect.

This is a good book for those who want to know more about gems than they will hear when buying stones or carvings. ( )