In this book you find classical biochemistry, and a lot of it. In contrast to most other biochemistry textbooks which drift away from the topic and go more and more into cell biology, immunology and the like, Metzler concentrates on the central topics of biochemistry, the enzymes and their mechanisms. There is no other book where one is more likely to find detailled infomation on the structure-function relation of just about any enzyme (with the only downside of having only black-and-white pictures, even for structures). This book is, however, to be treated with caution: it is not covering the topics of most biochem beginners courses (or is providing too much information that is about to overwhelm inexperienced readers, respectively). Still, it will be an unavoidable desk reference to any biochemist who cares about enzymes and will be highly valuable at least as long as the previous edition from 1977.