Humble Pi: A Comedy of Maths Errors

In "the first ever maths book to be a no. 1 bestseller," stand-up mathematician Matt Parker unveils the hilarious results of maths going wrong in the real world. Our modern lives are built on maths: computer programmes, finance, engineering. And most of the time this maths works quietly behind the scenes, until ... it doesn't. Exploring and explaining a litany of glitches, near-misses and mishaps involving the internet, big data, elections, street signs, lotteries, the Roman empire and a hapless Olympic shooting team, Matt Parker shows us the bizarre ways maths trips us up, and what this reveals about its essential place in our world.

• Paperback, 336 pages