I once heard the book by Meyer (1993) described as a "vulgarization" of
wavelets. While this is true in one sense of the word, that of making a
subject popular (Meyer's book is one of the early works written with the non-
specialist in mind), the implication seems to be that such an attempt
somehow cheapens or coarsens the subject.
I have to disagree that popularity goes hand-in-hand with debasement.
While there is certainly a beautiful theory underlying wavelet analysis, there is
plenty of beauty left over for the applications of wavelet methods. This book
is also written for the non-specialist, and therefore its main thrust is toward
wavelet applications. Enough theory is given to help the reader gain a basic
understanding of how wavelets work in practice, but much of the theory can
be presented using only a basic level of mathematics. Only one theorem is
formally stated in this book, with only one proof. And these are only included
to introduce some key concepts in a natural way.