A World Full of Math

Woo, Eddie.  Ir's A Numberful World: How Math is Hiding Everywhere...from the Crown of a Tree
          to the Sound of a Sine Wave.  New York: The Experiment, 2019.
         ISBN: 978-1-61519-612-8

Were you born a mathematician?  Do you like math?  Or did you like math and then got frustrated with it?  Does Algebra or Calculus strike dread in your soul? Or maybe you get lost in the variables of life and just need to know what is going on.  Eddie Woo strives to answer at least some of these questions in It's A Numberful Life.

Eddie Woo confesses in the Prologue that he had little joy in math, but then he began training as a mathematics teacher when he turned 19.  He had learned a secret - "Math is all around us."  In 26 short chapters, he takes the readers on a whirlwind tour of the world beginning with babies as mathematicians, then going up into the sky to question why rainbows are circles, diving into sound and music with wave cycles, comparing veins in your body with lightening, delving into cryptography, killer butterflies, and card tricks to astonish your friends, explaining why there are so many conspiracy theories, why electronic devices lie about how long they will last, and several other topics!  He provides plenty of visual examples to make the processing and absorption of information easier and much more fun.  And that is the key to this book.  Eddie Woo had fun writing this book and he wants the reader to have fun reading it!

So if you are looking for a quick reading, non-fiction book that may blow your mind and help you understand math, pick up It's A Numberful World and enjoy!

Reading More Than Just Narnia

Kort, Wesley A.  Reading C. S. Lewis: A Commentary.  Oxford: Oxford UP, 2016. 
          ISBN: 978-0-19-022134-8

When C. S. Lewis is mentioned, what pops into your mind?  Is it The Chronicles of Narnia?  Out of the Silent Planet?  Or maybe The Screwtape Letters.  Wesley A. Kort covers all of these and more in his commentary on C. S. Lewis.

Wesley A. Kort divides his reading of C. S. Lewis's works into three parts.  Part One examines Surprised by Joy, The Problem of Pain, The Screwtape Letters, and Mere Christianity.  He spends a chapter on each book and ends Part One with a chapter of what he considers reasonable assumptions.  In Part Two, he covers Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, The Abolition of Man, and That Hideous Strength, ending with a chapter of cultural critiques.  Part Three delves into The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Prince Caspian, The Four Loves, The Magician's Nephew,  and The Last Battle, and finishes with a chapter on some principles applied.

Wesley A. Kort makes clear in his introduction that he is writing a commentary not on his advocacy of Christianity or religion in general, but rather an examination of several constants found in his writings.  He is clear in what he admires about Lewis's writings.  He is also direct about what he finds troubling in Lewis's attitudes and viewpoints.  Overall, it is refreshing to have a reasonably clear eyed view of C. S. Lewis which is not colored by religious bias.

Atomic Espionage

Kean, Sam.  The Bastard Brigade: The True Story of the Plot to Stop the Nazi Atomic Bomb.  New
          York: Little, Brown, and Company, 2019.  ISBN: 9780316381680

Are you looking for a read that promises, intrigue, dashing heroes, derring-do galore, plus a dash of science?  Well then, just settle yourself down, pick up The Bastard Brigade and join with Sam Kean as he finally writes a book on physics!

After opening with Boris Pash leading an Alsos team to capture a scientist in France during the Summer of 1944, Sam Kean returns to the 1930s and starts introducing characters such as Moe Berg, a major league catcher who also managed to become an accomplished spy, White Russian Boris Pash who started out as a teacher at the Hollywood High School, an all-star cast of scientists of many nationalities, and other bit players in this high-stakes drama.  Kean then walks the reader through the formation of Germany's Uranium Club, the growing awareness among the Allies that Germany was trying to create nuclear fission, followed by the urgent need to stop that from happening.  Thus was born the Manhattan Project, the Alsos teams with Boris Pash, and several OSS ventures starring Moe Berg and many others agents.  And he manages all this in just 60 short chapters.

In The Bastard Brigade, Sam Kean has produced a very readable popular history of the struggle to stop the Nazi Atomic Bomb from ever occurring.  As in other books he has written, he provides lists of sources, but not direct citations which limits the use of this title by scholars and students, but perfect for public libraries.

The Army was in the Pacific in WW II?

McManus, John C. Fire and Fortitude: The US Army in the Pacific War, 1941-1943.  New York:
           Dutton Caliber, 2019.  ISBN: 9780451475046

When most readers think of World War II in the Pacific Theater, they think of Pearl Harbor, Midway, and Guadalcanal which star the US Navy and Marines.  But the war would not have been won with out the US Army.  Fire and Fortitude tells the story of the US Army in the Pacific from the time of Pearl Harbor to the beginning of the march on Japan.

John McManus divides the book in two sections - Onslaught and Turnabout.  In Onslaught, the reader finds chapters on the Pearl Harbor attack, the invasion and fall of the Philippians, the war in China and Australia, and a chapter on the prisoner of war (POW) camps.  In Turnabout, the reader sees the US Army and its Allies striking back in New Guinea, Guadalcanal (the US Army played a crucial role there), Burma, China, and the invasion of Makin where the Army fared better than the Marines at Tarawa.  There is also another chapter on the changing conditions at the POW camps in  Philippians and Japan.

John McManus has done a credible job of presenting the role of the US Army in the Pacific Theater of WWII.  He works to provide details from both combat and other aspects of Army life.  It is interesting that he provides details on the US Army POWs in the Pacific.  The book breaks off abruptly after the Makin invasion, but that is due to the scope of the book.  In tone Fire and Fortitude reminds the reader of the Official Histories put out by the US Army that are available in US Government Repositories.  But if you are looking for a one volume introduction to the role played by the US Army in the early part of WWII, Fire and Fortitude will work.

A Friend of Dickens

Ackroyd, Peter.  Wilkie Collins.  New York: Nan A Talese/Doubleday, 2015.
          ISBN: 978-0-385-53740-7

Are you interested in early detective tales?  Have you exhausted Poe, grown tired of Dickens, and not wanting to read another Agatha Christie?  Then give Wilkie Collins a try! He wrote the Woman in White and  The Moonstone among several other dramas.  And in this brief biography Peter Ackroyd provides a road map to his work and life.

In less than 300 pages and  twenty short chapters Peter Ackroyd covers the life of William Wilkie Collins from his birth in 1824 to his death in 1889.  And what a life it was.  Each chapter provides information on the books being written and events of his life - where he was living, trips taken and overall flow of his engagement with society or lack thereof.  

His father was a decent painter and was the subject of Wilkie Collins first book.  In spite of passing the bar, Wilkie Collins made his living by writing books, stories, and articles.  He was a friend of Charles Dickens and worked with him on plays and wrote for his periodicals.  He had two mistress and several children, but no wife, so definitely not your typical Victorian.  As the reader of his books discover, his peculiarities and viewpoints were often at odds with Victorian sensibilities.  The reader will also find out that the tales are crafted to keep the reader engaged and reading which fits with most of the tales being published in circulating periodicals before appearing in book form.

In Wilkie Collins, Peter Ackroyd provides a mosaic of the life of a writer in the Victorian age who shaped the melodrama and mystery genres that are read today. 

Science Fiction Author Interviews

Ward, Joy.  Conversations From The Edge: The Galaxy's Edge Interviews.  Rockville, MD:
         Arc Manor Publishers, 2019.

Every reader has their favorite author or multiple favorite authors.  Just like ice cream it is hard to have just one flavor that you want all the time!  Reading about the author can almost be as fun as reading the author.  And when one has the chance to read an interview or listen to an interview with their author(s), who can pass that up?  I can't, can you?  That opportunity to read an interview is what Joy Ward provides in Conversations From The Edge.  She has reprinted extended interviews of 24 authors and 1 editor that originally had appeared in The Galaxy's Edge.

The book opens with a George R. R. Martin interview from May 2016 and closes with a David Drake interview from July 2018.  There are interviews with Peter Beagle, Eric Flint, David Gerrold, David Weber, Connie Willis, and Harry Turtledove.  Toni Weisskope of editor of Baen Books is also interviewed.  My favorite interviews were with Peter Beagle and Harry Turtledove.  The most disappointing interview for was with Larry Niven.  And of all the authors interviewed, only one was new to me.

Conversations From the Edge provide a frank look into how authors got into writing and how they want to be remembered.  So read this book and find out if your favorite author is interviewed.

Details, just the Gorey details

Dery, Mark.  Born to be Posthumous: The Eccentric Life and Mysterious Genius of Edward Gorey. 
          New York: Little, Brown, and Company, 2018.

How well do you know Edward St. John Gorey?  How many of his little books have you read?  Or are you a fan of his book covers and art work?  Maybe you only know him from the credits to PBS's Mystery program.  But if you want plenty of details, you have the right book in hand.

Mark Dery provides plenty of details in his biography of Gorey.  He starts with his childhood in Chicago, followed by his stint in the US Army which he spent mainly at the Dugway Proving Ground in Utah.  After his discharge, Gorey used his GI Bill benifits to attend Harvard majoring in French, but mainly spent his time writing and drawing while hanging out with the likes of Frank O'Hara and John Ciardi.  After graduating and haning around Boston for a couple of years and getting caught up in the Poets' Theatre, Gorey moved to New York City to work in the art department of Anchor Books.  There he created book covers, did illustrations, all while working on his own material.  While in NYC, he perfected and published a number of small books and then got the stage-bug when he designed the set for John Wulp's Dracula which got him fame, notice, and royalties!  Then his books started selling and he moved to Cape Cod in 1985.  For the last 15 years, he wrote some, illustrated some and had fun putting on plays until he died in 2000 from a heart attack.

Mark Dery does a good job of documenting Gorey's life and his work.  He also does a commendable job of placing Gorey in context to the society and culture.  He does have a tendency to focus on particular aspects of Gorey's life that tends to distract from Gorey's life rather than explain it.  But overall, a very decent read of Gorey and his work.