Letters to a Young Mathematician by Ian Stewart

AS A professor of mathematics at the University of Warwick, UK, (and mathematics consultant for New Scientist), Ian Stewart ought to know what it’s like to be a mathematician. This book is his attempt to tell us, written in the form of a series of avuncular letters to a student as she progresses from school to a career. He shows us how mathematicians work, rest and play, and what kind of jokes they tell each other. He’s just as happy discussing whether God is a mathematician or whether alien mathematics will turn out to be the same as ours. As a mentor for a budding…