Beyond Infinity: A MatheMATTical Adventure

by Charles Ames Fischer

When high school senior Matthew “MatheMatt” Forsythe discovers a weird computer and a secret door at school, a series of events unfolds where he and his friends solve one mathematical puzzle after another. After finding a teleportal, Matt and his friend Kelsie travel to a strange world where numbers are actually alive! There they meet the mad scientist Maglio and the ghostly Fifty-Seven and discover that some of the numbers are mysteriously disappearing.

They must race against time to find the significant numbers Sixty-One and Three Hundred Thirteen. But why are the numbers disappearing? And what is so important about the number eight?

Genres: Mathematics, Fiction

298 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2013

Reviews

[Trever · Rating 2 out of 5]

The beginning of the book was very slow, the book doesn't seem to have any general direction. The homework parts don't make any sense since nothing is mentioned about them in the book, as well as the QR codes, I scanned many of them and they are just the same QR code over and over again, which doesn't make any sense.

The end of the book gets to the point more, without weird moments where the main character is talking to someone then himself the next line, it is quite strange. It seems that the story doesn't match what the author intended.

[Devany Valdez · Rating 3 out of 5]

In this book, it was mainly about Matt and Kelsie going on an adventure to look for Maglio; Which turned out to be the bad guy of the book. I liked this book because it was adventurous. However,i did not like this book because of all the math it had in it. I am not a big fan of math.

[Aimee · Rating 1 out of 5]

The book was pretty bad. The story line was fine, but only odd people want to read 5 pages about the number 313. The characters are all nerds, I would hate to be friends with them. There were also grammatical errors? Not my favorite. If you want a math book, read The Phantom Tollbooth.

[Jaime K · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a fun book of math, patterns, numbers, school, and adventure. The first half did feel a little pointless, but it was still fun. As a teacher, I really enjoyed the assignments - though I would like to understand what the Level writing assignments are.

The second half of the book had a lot of errors in the Kindle version. I can only assume they aren't there in the hard copy.

As someone else mentioned, the QR codes linked to the same site and the assignments didn't make sense in the context of the book.

Matt is a math whiz, and is taking Advanced Calc as a senior. He discovers some strange electronic device in the boy's bathroom one day and gets together a group of 5 other friends (because 6 is a nice circular number) to crack the initial code and all those that follow. I learned a few things about math that gave me new perspectives on things. I hope to remember them during the school year!

Matt nearly cracks everything, and his friend/group member Kelsie is the only one who goes with him into the..alternate universe? That's where the actual adventure begins.

Some of it was quite funny, including the final note at the end.

[Robert Spillman · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an excellent read. Beyond Infinity is a suspense involving high school students who eventually solve a mystery that one of them discovered in, of all places, the Boy's Restroom. Each step of the challenge in solving the mystery is accomplish with a mathematical solution. The fun was that most were not simple challenges. They all rely on knowledge of important, but not well recognized, mathematical relationships. The magic is that the story draws the reader into learning about these relationship with interest. Some, like the Fibonacci Sequence, are fairly well known and easy to understand, but the book takes one into the even deeper mysteries of number relationships. I'll admit to a certain fascination with numbers before I started, but I believe this book's approach makes them far more interesting to all and is a clever way of informing the reader of some of math's mysteries in an enjoyable guise of a mystery suspense.

[Jacqueline Isaacs · Rating 4 out of 5]

A must-read for young adults interested in math, science, and/or literature - or those who ought to be interested, whatever the case may be. The story is an excellent example of how math and writing can compliment each other. The ending was truly a surprise, and the thought with which I came away from the book was "I need to re-read this!" I'm sure that's a victory for any author.

Full disclosure: I helped fund this book through KickStarter, and would gladly assist this author in the future. http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/5...

[Cheryl]

Seems inappropriate for a list labeled Top Rated Educational Math Books for Children. The list is primarily picture books and this appears to be YA fantasy fiction.

[Renee MA · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book had so much potential. There could have been a really good book with the help of a really good editor.