The Three Body Problem

By Catherine Shaw,

Book cover of The Three Body Problem

Book description

Cambridge, 1888, Miss Vanessa Duncan is recently arrived from the countryside to teach. But everything changes when Mr Akers, a Fellow f Mathematics, is found dead. When a second and then third mathematician are murdered, it becomes a race against time to solve the case.

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Why read it?

1 author picked The Three Body Problem as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

The Three Body Problem is a real-life unsolved math problem concerning the motion of three bodies (think a star and two orbiting planets), all acting on each other by the pull of gravity. Given their positions and movements at times, what will happen in the future? Will they eventually fly away or fall into the star?  

The Three Body Problem is also a mathematical mystery by Catherine Shaw (a pen name – shhh), set in Cambridge in Victorian times, which contains three actual dead bodies, all of the mathematicians working on the eponymous problem. Another mathematician, who knew all three…

From Leila's list on mathematical mysteries.

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