This book helps the student complete the transition from purely manipulative to rigorous mathematics. The clear exposition covers many topics that are assumed by later courses but are often not covered with any depth or organization: basic set theory, induction, quantifiers, functions and relations, equivalence relations, properties of the real numbers (including consequences of the completeness axiom), fields, and basic properties of n-dimensional Euclidean spaces.

The many exercises and optional topics (isomorphism of complete ordered fields, construction of the real numbers through Dedekind cuts, introduction to normed linear spaces, etc.) allow the instructor to adapt this book to many environments and levels of students. Extensive hypertextual cross-references and hyperlinked indexes of terms and notation add truly interactive elements to the text.