Reading is a habit that can be started at any age, it is enough to read a good book to sow the seed.

I remember that in my adolescence I did not like to read, it was until I was 24 years old that being in a boring and routine job when I remembered the old book that my father always read and that seemed to amuse him, so the same boredom led me to grab that book and start browsing through it, to my surprise I got hooked in the story and I have read it 3 times in my life.

Book

The man who calculated

Its genre is fiction, literature mentioning mathematics and its first edition was in 1938, it is a book that is still in force obtaining fifth place of the best selling books in the world, according to what was published in the newspaper O Globo in May 2004. Press of Brazil, the author's country of origin.

It is a novel divided into 34 chapters where every day and use is linked to mathematics, through stories and legends, making it easy and entertaining, showing us logically and simply, the way to solve the problems that are described, with the adventures and journey of the main character and how in his journey he manages to solve mathematical problems helping others.

As an example of the mathematical problems and the solutions provided in the book, I will review only 2 of the ones that I remember caused me a good impression.

Number 1 is found in Chapter III

3 brothers were having a heated argument and they had a total of 35 camels nearby. The main character, concerned about this situation, approached and asked the reason for the dispute. The problem was that the father of these 3 men had died and they had inherited their 35 camels from him. The eldest brother was entitled to half, the middle son to a third, and the youngest son to a ninth. Unfortunately, all the divisions were not exact and this is the reason for the quarrel between them.

The calculating man skillfully proposed a solution to this problem to which the brothers agreed, always taking care that all involved were satisfied with the results and at the same time he obtained a profit for giving the solution, pay attention.

The calculating man added his friend's animal to the 35 camels, at first his friend did not like the idea but the calculating man convinced him to trust him and the solution he was proposing, so he agreed to lend it to him and then began the partition of the camels as an inheritance.

They now had 36 camels, and they recalculated. The eldest initially got 17 and something more but now he got 18 and he should not complain; the middle brother, at the beginning he would get 11 and something and now he would get 12 and he would not complain; the youngest brother got 3 and something and now with the calculation of the calculating man he got 4, so he should not complain either. Now, adding 18+12+4 gave a total of 34, leaving a camel that the main character (the man who calculated) decided to take since he had provided the solution to the problem of the brothers and would return the camel he borrowed from his Baghdadi friend and so they could continue their journey and each one on his camel.

I hope they got the account. 🤔☺️

Number 2 is found in Chapter XXIV

A Turk went for help to the calculating man, requesting him to indicate whether his bride and future wife were ugly or pretty. The calculator asked him for the dimensions of his fiancée's face.

So for a whole to be divided into two unequal parts and in the same way appear beautiful, it must have a larger and a smaller part and keep the same relationship between them and between the whole, this is the definition of what is known as golden division.

To date, it has not been possible to decipher the reason for this rare beauty. Mathematicians and thinkers who study this and make observations, present many illustrations to better explain the concept.

The calculating man, after evaluating and studying them, replied to the Turk that his fiancée was beautiful so that the man did not hesitate for a moment to marry her.

Images of perfect faces according to the golden ratio.

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Final thoughts

The main intention of the author of this book was to motivate people to enter the mathematical sciences, to be attracted by numbers.

I recommend this book because it is fun and takes you on an adventure while gaining a logical analysis.

And that concludes my participation in the January book review contest , you still have time to participate.

Thanks for joining me, now tell me, have you already read this book? If so, what did you think of it? If you haven't, does my review encourage you in any way to want to read it? I look forward to your comments.

_{Images without source are my own, captured with the camera of my Huawei Honor 8s cell phone.}