I kept waiting for the kind of happy reconciliation that never quite comes. Instead we get Wilkinson declaring that math 'as a brute, malign and mechanical thing.' He confesses that by the end of his journey, he was still consumed by 'an indignant resistance'.

Look, now: Buried amid this summer's beach reads, your Grishams and Hilderbrands, is a literary treasure.

With his smooth writing, ingenious descriptions, and analogies, this motivational book should be a welcome gift to many readers who have spent decades avoiding math because of early frustrations with learning it in school. Wilkinson explains many mathematical topics in an easy, clear, and understandable way.

Inspiring reading for anyone seeking to overcome intellectual defeat in any realm..

In a unique combination of memoir and intellectual spelunking, Wilkinson takes readers into the heart of math’s complex mysteries and the biggest questions that arise. What unfolds is a wide-ranging exploration of identity, philosophy, faith, the history of mathematics, and the nature of the divine. Mathematics has always been a subject pointing its practitioners toward a sense of the unknown, and Wilkinson’s quest becomes something akin to a spiritual pursuit. This is a deeply insightful, lyrical, and erudite work, filled with gems of wisdom and fascinating digressions, all characterized by Wilkinson’s delightfully dry, self-deprecating humor. He proves it’s never too late to learn something new, even if what you learn isn’t what you expected, and even high-school math can blossom into surprising vistas of metaphysical and psychological significance..

Mr. Wilkinson gives his journey the quintessential New-Yorker-super-duper-feature treatment. While he struggles with learning math, his capacious curiosity leads him to roam far and wide through the discipline’s history and philosophy. For starters, the question, 'What is mathematics?' generates an illuminating riff...In this context, Mr. Wilkinson is entirely in his element, telling tales with his easily acquired, elegant erudition—especially when he ventures out to meet mathematicians..

Wilkinson’s slyly entertaining prose captures both the frustrations of learning math and the rare exhilarations when it’s mastered. Readers who have stared blankly at a sheet of equations will find this odyssey a treasure..