I don’t even know what to say about this book. It is a book of paradoxes – a paradox is “conflict between reality and your feeling of what reality should be like” and has a bunch of brain teasers in it. A lot of them made me crazy trying to figure it out. A lot of them blew my mind. I really don’t know how to write about this book – but if you want your mind blown then you have to read it. If you’re interested in Math and crazy brain teasers you have to read it. The only notes I wrote about this book was “mind blown”. I can’t even explain it but these paradoxes definitely made me rethink everything I thought I knew about math!
I received a free e-copy of this book in order to write this review. I was not otherwise compensated.
About the Book
Two fathers and two sons leave town. This reduces the population of the town by three. True? Yes, if the trio consists of a father, son, and grandson. This entertaining collection consists of more than 200 such riddles, drawn from every branch of mathematics. Math enthusiasts of all ages will enjoy sharpening their wits with riddles rooted in areas from arithmetic to calculus, covering a wide range of subjects that includes geometry, trigonometry, algebra, concepts of the infinite, probability, and logic. But only an elementary knowledge of mathematics is needed to find amusement in this imaginative collection, which features complete solutions and more than 100 black-and-white illustrations.
“Mr. Northrop writes well and simply. Every so often he will illuminate his discussion with an amusing example. While reading a discussion of topology, the reviewer learned how to remove his vest from beneath his jacket. It works every time.” — The New York Times