Reading a scheme

Start with the conditions. A strong base, an acid, a metal, a peroxide: the reagent line narrows the reaction type before you look at a single bond.
Find what changed. Compare starting material and product atom by atom: which bond formed, which left, and whether the carbon count grew.
Substitution vs. elimination vs. addition is a bookkeeping question: same number of σ bonds, fewer, or more.
Mechanism follows structure. A tertiary or benzylic center with a weak nucleophile points to a cation; a primary center with a strong nucleophile does not.
Every example here is a real reaction with a real citation. The yields are the authors’ own.

Hydride reduction of aldehydes and ketones

3 real reactions from the literature, on six-membered cyclic ketones and aryl ketones. Each scheme shows starting materials, conditions and products, with the yield and reference where the source reports them.

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Hydride reduction of carbonyl: fluorenone (an aryl ketone) gives fluoren-9-ol (the benzylic alcohol).

Hydride reduction of carbonylRealOChem worksheet
Hydride reduction of carbonyl: 4-tert-butylcyclohexanone (a six-membered cyclic ketone) with 1) LiAlH4, AlCl3, ether; 2) t-BuOH, Δ; 3) H2SO4, H2O gives the secondary alcohol.

Hydride reduction of carbonylOrg. Synth. Coll. Vol. 5, p. 175
Hydride reduction of carbonyl: a six-membered cyclic ketone with 1) NaBH4; EtOH; 2) H+ gives the secondary alcohol.

Hydride reduction of carbonylRealOChem worksheet