Blayne Sucks

This post is a part of The Great American Novel Challenge. If you’re interested in taking part in the challenge, feel free to jump right in next month.

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald is classic required reading for high school students across the country. However, I somehow managed to avoid reading this book until a time of my own choosing. (Though I was required to read Like Water for Chocolate which no one outside of my high school seems to have read.) The Great Gatsby is also considered universally to be a masterpiece of American literature. It was chosen by editors from Random House as the second best novel published in the English language since 1900. Radcliffe Publishing chose it as the best novel in their rival list. It is consistently mentioned as a Great American Novel, and it is only about 180 pages long, so it’s a perfect way to start investigating all those things that you should have read when they were assigned.

I have to confess that this was one of the books that led me to create the Great American Novel Challenge. I chose to spend part of my summer improving my writing, and in this effort, I found Susan Bell’s analysis of how editing improved The Great Gatsby. I felt convicted for not having read the book. Now that I have read it, I feel like I need to read it again. Almost as soon as I finished I knew that Susan was right: this book was meticulously crafted. The book has not become outdated; it has become more elegant with age. This is where all that careful editing pays off. There are several sentences, particularly later in the novel, that are packed with meaning.

One could say that The Great Gatsby is another book about materialism or debauchery, but that sells it short. One could also say that it is about one man’s attempt to recapture the past, but that too sells the novel short. It is about the nature of authentic love, but again, labeling it as such sells it short. It is about the culture war between the midwest and the east coast, but in some ways it is about every culture war. It is about achieving the American Dream, or maybe defining your own American Dream, but this too seems to be incomplete.

Perhaps it is best to label The Great Gatsby as the first book to explore the quarter-life crisis. Although the term itself is relatively new, Fitzgerald shows that the concept is not. Virtually all the characters are in their late twenties and early thirties. They are all frustrated with their relationships, struggling to form meaningful long-term plans, and most of them are nostalgic for some earlier time in their lives when things seemed to make sense. F. Scott Fitzgerald was in his late 20′s himself when the book was published. It seems that Generation X and Generation Y are not the first to wonder about their place in the world. Even before America was a world superpower, Americans have struggled with trying to find a way to live meaningfully, contribute to the world, and in so doing become the “greatest” images of ourselves. In many ways, we are still living in the Jazz Age.

I promised myself that regardless of the books I chose to read as a part of the Great American Novel Challenge, I would offer some critique rather than simple-minded, endless affection. It’s easy to praise the things that worked because everyone likes to hear about what works. In addition, most reviewers don’t want to believe that they read something generally not worth reading. However, no book is perfect, and for me the part of the book that was least effective was the role of Nick Carraway as both participant in the novel and narrator of the novel. Weaving between these two literary roles would be challenging for any author, but Fitzgerald doesn’t do it well enough to avoid all confusion about whether Nick was a ‘real’ character. Nick’s character development seems stunted, particularly in the early parts of the book. I suppose this bothered me less by the end either because Nick was more of a participant or because I had grown accustomed to it.

Nick’s character development aside, The Great Gatsby is a fantastic book. It’s a short read, and if you haven’t read it you can easily finish it in an afternoon. Since much of the book actually takes place around the fourth of July and throughout the summer, I would urge you to consider reading it on a lazy summer Saturday afternoon. It’s not as stuffy or “intellectual” as you might think. There’s drugs, sex, controversy, murder, and all the things that would get it an R rating if Michael Bay turned it into a movie.

Now that I’ve posted this review, I have officially accepted the Great American Novel Challenge. One book down, twelve to go. I will update this post on Monday with a list of the links to other participating blogs. If you are interested in participating, feel free to start at any time.

[Update: At this point in the challenge, there are two other participating bloggers. Allison posted her review of Absalom, Absalom! (William Faulkner, 1936) on the morning of the 4th, and Carl posted his review of The Last of the Mohicans (James Fenimore Cooper, 1826) just under the wire on the evening of the 4th. I'd encourage you to take a look at their thoughts on these books. If you're interested in participating, grab a book and post a review on August 4th.]

The notion of the Great American Novel is deeply ingrained in American culture. The term “Great American Novel” simultaneously describes historic novels from American authors that accurately captured a time period of American culture and idealizes the goal of producing or discovering such a work oneself. Authors want to write it. Readers want to discover it. (Copyeditors want to copyedit it.)

Ironically, the books that might be labeled as the Great American Novel are typically books that many Americans have never read. If you consider yourself an avid reader (as I consider myself), and you reflexively felt a little bit of painful truth in that statement, then you may be interested in my proposed solution to this problem called “The Great American Novel Challenge.”

In short, the goal of this challenge is to read and review 13 novels you have previously not read. The novels must qualify as candidates for the title of the Great American Novel. After completing this challenge, you can claim with confidence that you have attempted to read the Great American Novel. There are 13 official rules for anyone wishing to participate in The Great American Novel Challenge:

1. Seek out the 13 novels you consider to be contenders for the title of the Great American Novel. This rule is intended to allow for a broad range of books while also picking a number with some significance for American culture: There were 13 original colonies that eventually became American states.
2. The authors of these books must be American. Because immigration is a huge part of American culture, this can include authors who immigrated to America and were American citizens for much of their lives.
3. Pick at most two books from any decade. Most lists of this sort will have serious clumping in the 1930′s or the 1960′s. This rule is intended to subvert that, at least partially. We’re seeking diversity!
4. Choose only one book per author. This rule is also intended to improve the diversity of the experience because America is a pretty darn diverse place.
5. Select only fictional novels. Do not pick histories, abriged summaries, biographies, poetry, manifestos, etc.
6. Choose only books you have not previously read. You can pick books that you were supposed to have read in high school, but you didn’t actually read or you can’t remember reading. (My own high school English teachers are probably flabbergasted at the thought of me starting a challenge like this.) The point here is to broaden your own experiences. Besides, the Great American Novel is really more of a search or a journey than a book or a thing.
7. Post a review on your blog on the 4th of every month from July 4, 2009 up to and including July 4, 2010. Thus, your first book review would be posted July 4, 2009. It would be followed by your second book review on August 4, 2009, your third book review on September 4, 2009, and so on. It seems like an appropriate timeline for finding the Great American Novel.
8. Do not disclose your list publicly; each book must be a surprise announced no more than one month ahead of time. Plus, this will give you the ability to allow your early selections to influence your later selections. Keep the goal in mind as you progress through the challenge and remember that you’ve only got thirteen selections to make.
9. Your posted review must explain how you feel the novel has contributed to American literature and culture. There are no length or formatting requirements for these reviews. In fact, this is the only real content requirement. I believe the Great American Novel is one that captures and explains a weird little piece of the American experience that all Americans notice, even if it is so tacit that we never speak about it. You may have your own definition or understanding of the Great American Novel, and that’s perfectly fine as long as you explain what it is and how you feel the book you chose fits or doesn’t fit it.
10. You must actually read the novel you choose. This is a pretty basic rule, and it is implied by the other rules. However, sometimes rules like this are stronger when you actually write them out. This is not high school. There is no test; there is no grade. If you choose to accept this challenge, then the only thing you have at stake is pride. Of course, Americans are a proud people from time to time.
11. Post a final review of your thirteen month experience searching for the Great American Novel no earlier than July 5, 2010 and no later than August 4, 2010. As a part of this review, try include a list of the books you wished you could have read during the challenge and why. Talk about what you learned and which books you would re-read. You may also wish to pick a single novel that you thinks is *the* Great American Novel.
12. If you post a book review on your blog on July 4, 2009, then you have formally accepted this challenge. Everyone will know if you don’t live up to it. If you accept this challenge, then your pride is on the line. Can you actually read thirteen candidate Great American Novels in thirteen months?
13. In one of the thirteen months of this challenge, you must break these rules. What can I say? Americans like to break rules. You get to pick which month and which rules, so be creative in how you choose to do it. Don’t forget to explain how you broke the rules and why.

Do not take this challenge lightly. Reading and reviewing 13 books in 13 months is not easy. Only 37% of Americans read more than 10 books per year. It may even be the case that one in four Americans don’t read at all. Do not be discouraged by these numbers! Take the challenge seriously, but set your goals high and see what happens! I believe the challenge will be extremely rewarding even if we all fail halfway through. If you leave a comment on this post or link to it with a trackback or pingback, then I will post a summary of all the participating blogs. Our posts will also encourage one another to keep reading, writing, and posting.

Finally, I would urge those of you wishing to participate in this challenge to spread the word. There’s more than a month before the challenge begins, so you have plenty of time to pick your first book, read it, and post a review on the 4th of July. The more people participating, the more likely we will all be able to complete the challenge.

Outliers: The Story of Success is the latest best-selling book by Malcom Gladwell, author of Blink. It describes the impact of culture, opportunity, and environment on the extraordinarily successful. For example, it provides an explanation for the success of Bill Gates, the Beatles, and Joe Flom. It also provides an explanation for the lack of extraordinary success of some for whom extraordinary success seemed likely. If you are interested, here’s a New Yorker article with a similar premise.

The premise of Outliers is that extreme success is driven more by opportunity than talent. This means that our cultural background can give us small advantages that accumulate almost like compound interest over the course of our lives. Gladwell argues that the typical understanding of outliers in society is wrong. He claims it is easier to believe that the Hollywood hero is heroic based on some inherent quality rather than hard work, seized opportunity, and a little bit of luck. He believes that inherent talent is emphatically not the real story of success.

In a very broad sense, I agree with Gladwell’s assessment of extreme success. Success looks more like Batman than Superman. For those who haven’t kept up on their comics, Batman was a human like everyone else on the planet, but he was wealthy (opportunity) and had a random tragic event shape the course of his life (luck). Then he dedicated himself to his craft (hard work) and became a superhero crime fighter. On the other hand, Superman was an alien from another planet who, quite simply, was more powerful than everyone else. Now, Superman clearly had to choose to be a superhero and he had to make sacrifices along the way, but his overpowering natural gifts represent the typical way people view those who have achieved extraordinary success.

Aside from this broad agreement, I take issue with the way that Gladwell defines success throughout the book. ‘Success’ is described as everything from making the championship game in a junior hockey league to being one of the 75 wealthiest humans to ever walk the face of the Earth. Sure, if you want to be a founding partner in one of the world’s top five law firms, you’re going to have to have a few lucky breaks along the way, but what if your definition of success is living the upper middle class American dream? It’s never clear just how far ‘beyond normal’ Gladwell believes his premise holds.

One great example that stretches the ‘beyond normal’ limit is Gladwell’s discussion of the Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP) in the context opportunity over talent. KIPP schools are open-enrollment public schools for traditionally under-resourced urban areas. They are intense. Students at KIPP schools spend far more time working, learning, and doing homework than in traditional public schools. They have also had dramatically better results. Imagine that: If you work harder, you achieve more.

Gladwell argues that we can manufacture ‘success’ by paying attention to cultural legacies and understanding the importance of providing opportunity. This is where the book becomes transparently political. The thesis seems to evolve into a rainbow wonderland where we are all capable of extreme success. Of course, this all depends on what he really means by ‘success.’ It’s idiotic to think that we can all be professional athletes or one of the 75 wealthiest people ever. (Hint: there are more than 75 of us.) Not everyone will be lucky enough to fit all the background criteria and cultural landmarks necessary to have tons of opportunity staring them in the face. Some things cannot be controlled; some things, such as hard work and discipline, can be.

What the book really needs is a clarification of what Gladwell means by ‘success.’ Without this clarification, the book loses cohesion and it becomes unclear how broadly applicable the ideas described really are. In some stories, he clearly shows that hard work and discipline are necessary, but not sufficient, for extreme success (Bill Gates, Joe Flom). In other stories, he advocates that we can all achieve extreme success by simply manipulating our cultural environment (Korean Air, KIPP). In one story, he tells the story of Christopher Langan as someone who is apparently unsuccessful (or at least as someone who hasn’t lived up to his potential). These disparate stories make the book feel like more of a collection of anecdotes about different types of success than a single “story of success.”

All in all, it’s a very entertaining book, but I recommend reading it with a critical eye. It’s important to understand the definition of success for each story and to separate things that can be controlled from those that cannot be controlled.

If one were to take a national poll on the most important year in United States history, 1776 would easily be a top contender. Thomas Paine published Common Sense in January. Although not an American, Adam Smith published The Wealth of Nations, which had (and continues to have) extraordinary influence on American financial history. The Continental Congress signed the The Declaration of Independence that summer. Perhaps most importantly, George Washington held together the young and inexperienced “rabble” that was the Continental Army throughout the course of that entire year and eventually through the conclusion of the war in 1783. This is the story told by David McCullough’s novel 1776.

Although 1776 is the first book by David McCullough that I have ventured to read, I had most certainly heard of the author before I began reading it. McCullough is one of the most decorated living historians in America, and I would be astonished if more than a few American readers haven’t heard of him. He has twice won the Pulitzer Prize and twice won the National Book Award. He has also received the highest honor bestowed to American civilians: the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

As a result of the author’s fame and previous success, I had extremely high expectations for 1776 in several areas. First, McCullough is known as a fastidious researcher, so I was expecting the book to provide details on the inner workings of the fledgling American Revolution. Second, McCullough is often praised as an exemplary story teller, and with the material he has to work with in the American revolution, I was expecting something amazing. Third, McCullough used many of his notes originally compiled in writing his biography of John Adams, so I was expecting much of the book to deal with the political relationship Washington maintained with the Continental Congress.

In regard to my first expectation, I was quite pleased with the details found throughout the novel. If anything, these details were the most redeeming aspect of the book to those who already know the story quite well. McCullough goes out of his way to drop some now-famous names of people who were at the time merely rising stars, including Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and Aaron Burr. I was also quite pleased to see many misconceptions dispelled. For example, I grew up learning that the Hessians in the Battle of Trenton were drunk or hungover at the time of the attack. Of course, this has been dispelled in many accounts, as McCullough dispels it here, but it was through this book that I learned the truth of the matter stated plainly.

As to my second expectation, McCullough is certainly a master story teller. Even knowing this beforehand did not prepare me for the fluidity of the book. I was truly surprised at how easy to read it is. It flows so quickly and effortlessly that I found my self reading it in large chunks. One of the primary reasons that I even picked the book up was to find some respite from the large amount of technical reading I have been doing recently, and I am pleased to say that it did not disappoint in the least, even though I was already quite familiar with the major events of the year.

Lastly, I was expecting a focus on Washington’s political discourse with the Continental Congress over the course of the year. This expectation was simply not met. Although there is some discussion of this important relationship, it was certainly not a highlight of the book. Each discussion of the relationship feels unbalanced because the book does not introduce or develop most of the important characters in the Continental Congress. I was left wondering if that is due to the coverage it received in his biography of John Adams, which I will endeavor to read.

My one major disappointment with the book was the artificial framing of the subject. Although 1776 was an extremely important year, it was just one of eight years (1775-1783) that comprised the American Revolution. Quite a few important events are not covered by this book including the winter in Valley Forge, enlisting the aid of France, signing the Treaty of Paris, and George Washington stepping back into the role of a civilian. Perhaps feeling a bit cheated at the missing events was somewhat inevitable. The entirety of the American Revolution itself has been the subject of many books, so I can understand why McCullough would not want to plow the same field all over again. However, I have no doubt that his talents would have made the remaining years and events of the Revolution exceedingly enjoyable stories to read.

On the whole, I can heartily recommend 1776. Owing to its easily accessible nature, it is perhaps best geared towards the average American, but there are certainly details that may interest those more deeply involved in studying history.

I decided to read Franz Kafka’s The Trial after seeing it used by Dan Solove to describe the no-fly list. I knew very little about the book before reading it.  I knew that it was about a man named Joseph K. who was arrested and then, despite his best efforts, completely unable to understand or control the resulting course of events. I also knew that it was one of the books that has motivated the term “Kafkaesque.” What I didn’t know was that it does all of these things in a “meta” sense as well, which has made the the book extraordinarily rich and entertaining to read.

What do I meant by my use of the word “meta” to describe The Trial? Anyone who has read Gödel, Escher, and Bach would probably understand what I mean if I re-phrased it by saying that The Trial is a Strange Loop. However, for those who haven’t read GEB, I will try to explain in more detail, particularly since this is the most delicious part of the book. The Trial was originally written in German, with which I have some experience, but I am not capable of reading a book at this level in German. Thus, it had to be translated. Every time I read a translated book I feel it tug at me a little: Am I really reading this as it was intended? This tugging adds a level of disorientation, which is really the entire point of The Trial.

Of course, Kafka wasn’t intending that everyone read a translated version of the book. In fact, Kafka may have never intended anyone to read the book. It was published posthumously and perhaps against his wishes. Now, there is perhaps some debate over whether or not there was a moral obligation to publish, but that debate is still going today. Thus, it is, in some sense, a book over which not even the author could exercise complete control.

Since it was published posthumously, it was never finished. There is an obviously incomplete chapter that simply ends. There are unfinished chapter fragments and deleted sections published as appendices in the printed version of the book that I read. In fact, literary scholars aren’t entirely sure about the order the chapters should appear. All of this only adds to the confusion and disorder that is depicted throughout the book.

If you haven’t read any of Kafka’s books, but you’re interested in learning a little bit about why Kafka is such an important author, then I would recommend The Trial as a good starting point. I enjoyed the “meta” aspects of the book, but there are certainly a lot of other themes that are enjoyable, including the role of women in the book, which was the biggest surprise for me. I won’t talk about it here though. You’ll have to discover it for yourself.

Ordinary Men by Christopher R. Browning is a book on Nazi Germany’s Reserve Police Battalion 101, which participated in the Holocaust. The primary discussion in the book is on how a group of ordinary, middle-aged Germans became mass murderers. He attempts to understand how this transformation took place, and he uses insights from the Milgram experiments and the Stanford Prison experiments. However, he is quick to point out in the forward of the book that “explaining is not excusing; understanding is not forgiving.”

The book was recommended to me by Lucas Layman after a discussion on the importance of the human element in computer security led to a discussion on the Milgram experiments and the Stanford Prison experiments. Certainly there are many elements of computer security and computer crime that can be better understood through studying human psychology. For example, the simple fact that as the men of Reserve Police Battalion 101 were removed from direct participation (e.g. pulling the trigger themselves) to indirect participation (e.g. leading Jews to death trains) they were more easily able to cope with their actions psychologically. Similarly, computer crime is easily disassociated because of the impersonal nature of dealing with computers rather than humans. However, after reading the book my strongest reaction has been broader than just computer security.

When I was in high school I had to read quite a few books on the Holocaust. It seemed that every year we read a different book on the subject, and I tired quickly of the extremes that were pushed. Nazi Germany in general and Hitler in particular have become famous for being the most extreme extreme. This is perhaps best identified by Godwin’s Law.

Ordinary Men suffers from over-extremism to some extent as well. For example, Browning causally refers to the Holocaust as the “most extreme genocide in human history” without offering much in the way of proof or comparison. The number of Native Americans systematically killed by Europeans and the number of Russians killed by Stalin’s regime could each easily exceed the numbers of Jews killed by the Holocaust. The rate of killing in Rwanda could easily surpass the rate of killing in the Holocaust. The brutality of groups like the Khmer Rouge and leaders like Genghis Kahn could be argued to be greater than that found in the Holocaust. Is it even possible to classify something like the “most extreme genocide in history?”

My point is that our only reaction to events like these cannot be the emotional one; we must attempt to understand why and how these things happen so that we can learn from them. We aren’t good at rationalizing emotions, and we are rarely able to draw objective conclusions based on them. However, if we can take a look at some facts, then we may be able to learn important lessons. For example, before the brutality caused by Nazi Germany and in former Yugoslavia, we see extreme hyperinflation. Do we know anywhere else in the world where that is happening right now? I think so. This is something to be concerned about.

More generally security is a field that suffers from extremely emotional reactions. The air travel response to the September 11th attacks is a good example. How many of these responses have been the result of reason rather than emotion? How many of them have actually improved airport security? These are questions that we will probably continue to struggle with for years because of the highly charged emotional response most Americans have to the September 11th attacks.

On the whole though, Browning does a good job of ensuring that we don’t view the people of Reserve Police Battalion 101 as caricatures of themselves. As a result, there are many lessons to be learned from this book. The Holocaust should not be thought of as an abstract evil thing, but instead as a real consequence of human plans and actions. As Browning says, “Ultimately, the Holocaust took place because at the most basic level individual human beings killed other human beings in large numbers over an extended period of time.” The book offers an objective take on how ordinary people are capable of such a thing. I found it to be a very worthwhile read.

As I mentioned in my last post, Randy Pausch‘s book The Last Lecture has become a runaway success. (And Randy has was named to Time Magazine’s 100 most influential people, which is an honor he absolutely deserves.) The day after Finals week ended I read the book cover to cover.

It is just over 200 pages and doesn’t take long to read. Despite the short length, there’s quite a bit of material packed into it. Randy has promoted the book as another medium for him to pass his life lessons on to his kids and it’s obvious that there’s a lot of material in the book that would be impossible for anyone with a terminal illness to talk about publicly without breaking down. He talks about how he met his wife, how they got engaged, and how his children were born.

There’s more to the book than just the stories. There’s an intimacy with the written word that is different than a speech, video or story. As a reader, you might be sitting in a comfortable chair in your house, on an airplane or in a waiting room, but the act of reading puts you in this separate world. Even if someone knows what book you’re reading they don’t know what part of that book. The only person who knows that is you. As a result of that magic and of Randy’s conversational style, this book absolutely seizes your attention.

The book’s message gets across loud and clear: Time is short. Live your life to the fullest. You truly can achieve your dreams. Never lose that optimism you had as a child.

A hard message to convey with authority, but Randy does so more than effectively. I sincerely urge you to consider getting this book. Don’t pick it up at the library. Go out and buy it. Read it every year. It’s short, and easily manageable in a day. Don’t let yourself get lost in life and forget the things that make it worth living in the first place.

I just ran across a post on Concurring Opinions that rocked me back in my seat. The full text of two of Dan Solove’s most popular books are now available online for free. The Digital Person and The Future of Reputation are both fantastic books. I have been meaning to reread them and get a review posted here, but one thing leads to another and this semester has become rather backlogged. However, in lieu of writing a short review that doesn’t do justice to either of these books, I will simply give them a heartfelt recommendation. Perhaps with the end of the semester rapidly approaching, I’ll be able to get a review of them up soon. In the meantime, I hope you’ll take a peek!

I have talked about some of the things I would like to see in electronic book readers before. I have a feeling that this is a list that is fundamentally incomplete simply because I haven’t sat down and actually analyzed the problem from an engineering standpoint. However, I read something on Cult of Mac recently that was truly depressing.

It appears that analyzing electronic book readers from an engineering standpoint is probably fruitless because they are fundamentally crippled from a marketing standpoint. Cult of Mac cites a New York Times blog post about Steve Jobs passion for computers and electronic devices. In that post Steve Jobs is quoted as saying the following about the Amazon Kindle:

“It doesn’t matter how good or bad the product is, the fact is that people don’t read anymore. Forty percent of the people in the U.S. read one book or less last year. The whole conception is flawed at the top because people don’t read anymore.”

His opinion on this area is probably more important than the average person might realize. One of the things that Jobs has demanded mercilessly has been incredible user interfaces. This goes back a long way to his interest in calligraphy. If anyone were to design an electronic reader and do it right, it would be Apple. If I were to bet, I would bet that they have considered making a product like this in recent years and ruled it out based on their findings.

Of course, Cult of Mac also posted a link to a recent study on reading by the National Endowment for the Arts. The full study is morbidly fascinating and about 100 pages long, many of which are charts on reading trends. It seems that at every level reading is in decline.

In particular, I thought that the statistics on those who were college educated or above were frightening. The report also makes some general conclusions that the decline of reading skills will affect our democracy. This makes sense if you consider the fact that our government was designed based on the idea that the citizenry would be educated and actively engaged in the process. Sort of an ominous thought to consider…

For many people the idea of reading a book about a mathematical proof right after finishing a semester in a Computer Science graduate program would be an apt definition of torture. First, I am not one of those people. Second, Fermat’s Enigma really isn’t a book about math so much as it is a book about determination and history. Third, it’s only a three hundred page book.

For those who may not be familiar with Fermat’s Last Theorem, it is one of the most famous problems in the history of mathematics. Many incredibly smart mathematicians worked on it and failed to solve it. Eventually, it was solved in a truly extraordinary fashion by Sir Andrew Wiles, who worked in isolation on the proof for seven years and then had to endure another year working to patch a flaw in the proof with the intense heat of the international spotlight on him.

Probably the most amazing thing about Fermat’s Last Theorem is that it was so simple to explain. The Pythagorean Theorem states that the length of the hypotenuse of a right triangle squared equals the sum of the squares of the other two sides. It’s a formula usually written as: x^2 + y^2 = z^2. Fermat’s Last Theorem states that this formula doesn’t have any non-zero whole number solutions for powers larger than two. More formally x^n + y^n = z^n where a, b, and c are whole numbers doesn’t hold for n > 2. Sounds pretty basic, and yet it took over 350 years to solve.

The book is made of two parts. First, it is part history of the problem and people who attempted to solve it. Second, it is part inspirationaly story of determination. The characters in the book are larger than life. There are some incredibly strange confluences of events that affected the people who were involved in Fermat’s Last Theorem. In particular, I thought the story of Sophie Germain was quite moving. I also found it personally amusing that the book discussed the Königsburg bridge problem since it was covered pretty early on in my Graph Theory course this semester.

Overall, I highly recommend the book to anyone who has a passing interest in mathematics or history. There’s plenty to go around. If you loved the book or the movie A Beautiful Mind, then you should not pass on this book! Of course, if you simply have something against reading, you can watch the PBS show about the solution to Fermat’s Last Theorem called The Proof, but really, the book is short and exceedingly good.