Zombies & Calculus
by Colin Adams
PS3601.D3698 Z34 2014
New Arrivals, 2nd floor
Math holding you back? Have you found that calculus just isn’t as simple as geometry? Never fear! The zombie apocalypse will save you! What? Well, surviving the zombie apocalypse may help you learn calculus anyway.
The author, UW-Madison graduate Colin Adams, has written dozens of scholarly articles, several mathematics books, and is the humor columnist for the Mathematical Intelligencer. All of this is key to his latest book, an enjoyable romp with zombies and calculus set in a small liberal arts town in Massachusetts. His target audience is calculus converts and more advanced calculus-philes, so it takes some knowledge of calculus to fully enjoy the novel. If this is you just jump right in. There are helpful appendices, even one that provides a brief review of calculus (as explained by Ellie to Connor), however, you really should know some calculus beforehand. If you don’t, perhaps 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami would more suitable. It also has a mathematician protagonistm but alas no zombies. For zombies I highly recommend Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Seth Grahame-Smith, which is coming out as a film in February 2016.
Use this link to read a two page excerpt of the novel from the Mathematical Intelligencer. Enjoy!
