Edward van de Vendel

For this book mathematician Ionica Smeets and I came up with a class of ten year olds who one day overhear their teachers talk about how dull the school's math books are. The kids agree and organize a protest: why isn't arithmetic about real stuff, about things they can use in their actual lives? The teachers make a plan: this year the kids can suggest new - valuable - math problems.

I wrote the 22 stories leading up to each math problem, stories in which we get to know all the children, and Ionica wrote the math answers. Examples of the questions are: How do I get rich? How do I win at every game? Is it better for the climate if we pee under the shower? If you gather all the tears you cry in your life, could you take a bath in them? Et cetera...

The wonderful artist Floor de Goede made illustrations in full color, but he also transformed the math explanations into funny comics. And hopefully the children in the book but also our readers will agree that yes, mathematics can be about real life. 

• Book design by Roald Triebels.

• A sample translation into English is available.

• The Dutch Literature Fund made a special in English about this book. Read it here.

• Rights can be obtained at our agent Elaine Michon at elami agency, here.