Famous in STEM

A seven-year-old solves in seconds a problem meant to keep his class busy for an hour. A self-taught clerk from India fills notebooks with formulas that stun Cambridge. A woman's calculations help send astronauts into orbit.

Mathematical Masterminds is Volume 2 of the Famous in STEM series: the brilliant, eccentric, and often underappreciated people who built the language of the universe, one idea at a time.

Discover the minds behind the math:

• Carl Friedrich Gauss: the "Prince of Mathematics" who stunned his teacher at age seven and never stopped

• Alan Turing: helped crack the Enigma code, laid the foundations of computer science, and was persecuted for who he loved

• Srinivasa Ramanujan: a self-taught prodigy whose mysterious formulas still inspire mathematicians today

• Katherine Johnson: the NASA mathematician whose hand calculations John Glenn trusted before his orbit

• Ada Lovelace: wrote what many call the first computer program, a century before computers existed

• John Nash: transformed game theory while battling mental illness for decades

• ...and more remarkable stories, from Pythagoras's secretive brotherhood to Euler, who kept publishing after going blind.

Each chapter turns abstract ideas into human drama, with simple diagrams and puzzles along the way. You don't need to be a math expert to enjoy it, just curious about the people who saw patterns the rest of us couldn't.

Great for: curious readers 13 and up, students researching a scientist for a school project, homeschool families, and adults who want the human stories behind the numbers.

The Famous in STEM series (every volume stands on its own):

1. The Greatest Physicists

2. Mathematical Masterminds

3. Tech Titans of Silicon Valley

4. Explosive Chemists

5. Brilliant Biologists

6. Medical Pioneers

7. Extraordinary Engineers