Book Review: How Many Socks Make A Pair? by Rob Eastaway

How Many Socks Make A Pair?

Surprisingly interesting everyday maths

by

Rob Eastaway

Mid-Summer Fun with Everyday Math - perfect for humidity-soaked middle-aged brains, tireless number nerds, and bored kids who can't wait to get back to school!Did you ever wonder how some people can calculate huge sums quickly in their heads (and on their fingers), or shuffle a deck of cards over and over and still have them lay out in their original order? It's not genius... or magic (although those things help); it's just everyday math! 

What do a limerick, a drawer full of socks, a newspaper, a pile of library books and a bathroom mirror have in common? The answer is that they all have some fascinating, even beautiful, maths hidden within them.

This book is a hands-on demonstration of maths that anyone, even a complete maths-phobe, can actually enjoy. Rob Eastaway explains these amazing feats, along with several other math trick, treats, problems and patterns in the humorous and clearly written How Many Socks Make a Pair?.  

About the AuthorRob Eastaway has written several bestselling books connecting maths with everyday life, including "Why do Buses Come in Threes?" and "How Many Socks Make a Pair?". His first book "What is a googly?", an introduction to cricket, was famously presented by John Major to President Bush (snr) at Camp David in 1992, and was published in the USA under the title "Cricket Explained".

With Mike Askew, he wrote "Maths for Mums & Dads", a book that helps parents to understand the new methods being used to teach maths, and offers ideas for how to make maths more engaging and fun at home. An American edition was published in 2010 entitled "Old Dogs, New Math".

Rob appears regularly on radio in the UK, and is a regular speaker. He has given talks about maths to just about every age groups in the UK, USA and Australia. He was President of the Mathematical Association from 2007-8. He is married with three young children.
How Many Socks Make A Pair can be purchased on Amazon.

Keep up with Rob Eastaway on Facebook and his website, robeastaway.com.


Our Thoughts
I like math.  I was good at it in school . . . which was a long time ago!  Nowadays, I use a calculator for just about everything.  With a business and a tight budget, I can't afford to make math mistakes! How Many Socks Make a Pair? is an entertaining book that shows the reader the math behind some every day things.  Chapters 2 (Calculating without a calculator) and 3 (Pick a card, any card) were my favorites. 

Math is being taught in our schools today in a very different way than when I was in school.  I knew some of the tricks in Chapter 2, like multiplying by 9 using your fingers and the Divisibility Test, but I didn't know The Gypsy Method or Squaring in your head. Chapter 3 was intriguing because growing up, a relative often did card tricks and us little kids could never figure one of them out.  The card trick that confused us so much as kids isn't mentioned in this book, but similar tricks are easily explained, so I have a better understanding what was going on in the one trick.

How Many Socks Make a Pair? goes on in further chapters to talk about coin tossing, palindromes, magic squares, triangles, and limericks among much more.  Definitely recommended - easy reading for anyone interested in math, including, as Rob Eastaway says, mathsphobes!  This would be a good book for kids, too; there are easily-understood demonstrations to help anyone learn.