Books

Math with Bad Drawings: Illuminating the Ideas That Shape Our Reality (2018) is a wacky gumball machine of a math book. Each standalone chapter is a deeply researched, poorly illustrated, and utterly irreverent tale of a mathematical idea, from spheres in Star Wars to psychology in lottery ticket purchases to math in the eyes of mathematicians. It is my bestselling book.

Change is the Only Constant: The Wisdom of Calculus in a Madcap World (2019) is a calculus storybook. It tells 28 stories — ranging from a petty dispute to a loathsome murder to a Sherlock Holmes mystery to an inside joke I always wanted to get — all to develop the ideas of calculus, and to show what they mean to human thinkers. It is the book that contains my best writing.

Math Games with Bad Drawings: 75 1/4 Simple, Challenging, Go-Anywhere Games — And Why They Matter (2022) is a whopping treasure chest of pencil-and-paper games. They include number games, psych-out-your-opponent games, and games that bend your fingers and mind. I’ve heard from five-year-olds who find the games fun and accessible; I’ve heard from math professors who find them intimidatingly deep. It is the book of mine that I most believe everyone should check out.

Math Games with Bad Drawings: The Ultimate Game Collection (2022) is a streamlined, ready-to-play version of the big yellow book. Great for road trips, restaurant waits, and children prone to boredom.

Math for English Majors: A Human Take on the Universal Language (2024) is a gentle, open-hearted guidebook for the self-identified “not a math person.” It is the book I’ve always wanted to write: a book that quietly distills the essence of school math, and equips you to join the conversations that you’ve been tuning out all these years. It is the most important book I’ve written.