Tao (mathematics U. of California-Los Angeles) presents a textbook based on the lecture notes of a graduate course he taught in 2010. It is not a comprehensive introduction to random matrix theory, he warns, but a discussion of selected elementary topics in it. Among the topics are eigenvalues and sums of Hermitian matrices, the central limit theorem, Gaussian ensembles, the circular law, and the Golden-Thompson inequality. Annotation ©2012 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)