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Random Positivity Thread: Happy Book Memories (awful.systems)

submitted 2 days ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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In the spirit of our earlier "happy computer memories" thread, I'll open one for happy book memories. What's a book you read that occupies a warm-and-fuzzy spot in your memory? What book calls you back to the first time you read it, the way the smell of a bakery brings back a conversation with a friend?

As a child, I was into mystery stories and Ancient Egypt both (not to mention dinosaurs and deep-sea animals and...). So, for a gift one year I got an omnibus set of the first three Amelia Peabody novels. Then I read the rest of the series, and then new ones kept coming out. I was off at science camp one summer when He Shall Thunder in the Sky hit the bookstores. I don't think I knew of it in advance, but I snapped it up and read it in one long summer afternoon with a bottle of soda and a bag of cookies.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 days ago

OK I lied I need to say more

I had transferred from a private school to a public elementary school which was way behind in my math education and for some reason no one thought to put me in a better math class. During this time my dad gave me Who is Fourier? A Mathematical Adventure.

This was a textbook with a lot of illustrations and little cartoon characters discussing the fourier waves overly enthusiastically. It was put out by a weird Japanese school ("The transnational college of LEX" -- I'm still not 100% convinced they're not some math and language cult or something).

Despite being about the fourier transform it assumed no knowledge from the reader besides basic arithmetic; and so covered trigonometry and calculus concepts where needed.

So despite only vaguely understanding a lot of the concepts in the book, it really set me up well for calculus class (when I finally got to that years later), and is probably the only reason I was good at math through university. That weird little math book that no one has heard of but I was obsessed with.