Introductory financial engineering is the most over-published topic in finance. Here's another one. In the tradition of Baxter and Rennie (1996) and Neftci (2000), Joshi delivers an intuitive introduction to some fairly sophisticated financial engineering. Like those other books, it targets readers who lack the background or inclination to learn stochastic calculus but want familiarity with the terminology and methodologies of financial engineering. This book won't make you a financial engineer, but it will help you to communicate with financial engineers.

Like Baxter and Rennie (1996) and Neftci (2000), Joshi delivers an informal introduction to concepts of stochastic calculus before proceeding to financial engineering. It differs from those other books in its emphasis on more practical applications. Both Baxter and Rennie and Neftci focus more on exploring advanced mathematical concepts or the theory underlying financial engineering. Joshi touches on such material on more of an as-needed basis. For this reason, Joshi can be a nice complement for either of those other books.

About half the book is dedicated to practical discussions of the pricing of exotics, interest rate derivatives, stochastic volatility and smile dynamics. Of course, "practical" is a relative term. This is a high-level treatment that doesn't delve into the nitty-gritty of implementing a pricing model. Indeed, lots of basic concepts receive only passing treatments as the book rushes towards more advanced discussions. Basic topics such as interest rates and compounding methods are explained in an ad hoc, as-needed manner. Indeed, at the start of the chapter on interest rate option pricing, the author advises that you forget everything he has already told you about continuously compounded interest rates.