The Tenth Muse audiobook

The Tenth Muse by Catherine Chung is as ambitious and intriguing as the conplex math problems Katherine, the protagonist of this remarkable novel aims to solve. This is a novel, the scope of which is staggering--as Katherine moves through her life trying to discover who she is while negotiating the world of mathematics as a woman who refuses to be silenced or sidelined for anyone, no matter what it costs her. In her second novel, Chung has crafted a story that is moving, elegant and richly written. Her prose, as it unfolds, becomes an elusive equation readers will yearn to solve.

this isnt the most exciting story out there. its quiet and understated, following the life of a woman in an unassuming way.its a life of academia and universities, the consequences of war, being at home and exploring abroad, as well as discovering ones own identity. i think if you prefer character driven novels and topics of mathematical mysteries, then this is the book for you!↠ 3.5 stars

Ebook, read ...own .... Plus....as a bonus ....I listened ( skimmed a little)... to the audiobook from the library (overdrive)....read by the ‘audiobook-goddess’ > *Cassandra Campbell*. “The Tenth Muse”.... was a FANTASTIC SURPRISE! I have no idea why I put off reading it — —reviews from * Peter, Paromjit, and Barbara*— are outstanding! Read them. I could honestly just cut and paste THEIR REVIEWS.... lol.... But....what my friends didn’t tell me, ( mean people), was “NOT TO MISS THIS BOOK”. I mean ‘really’ —“don’t skip this treasure” ......or listen to the audiobook ( either is great choice). It has a lot of emotional heart. Cassandra Campbell always does justice to the written words.....And...Catherine Chung ‘wrote’ outstanding words. ( great fit together). The storytelling drew me in immediately- it felt a little like a memoir- but it’s historical fiction. Nobody has to be mathematician ( you don’t even need to know how to add)...to enjoy this book ....but those who ‘are’ in mathematic academia - will delight in the math-chatter-problem-solving-sections. Silly me ( god I have too much time on my hands some days), I started googling Berhard Reimann .... wanting to know a little bit more about the German mathematician who made contributions to analysis, number theory, and differential geometry. ( if you just fell asleep reading that sentence - there is more from where it came from). Google is a nice friend. The biggest thing I learned —- was that people who try to conquer the Reimann Hypothesis, don’t do it for money! Well... there is $1 million dollars to be earned if you do... so I wouldn’t shake off the bonus prize too easily. So....with google’s help...I thought I’d quickly solve the challenging Reimann Hypothesis, for free! Ha...I failed. I just got hungry! But back to more chatter and book reporting on “The Tenth Muse”...There are main and subplots - themes worth discussing....ie...advance math,(numberphile), family, ( background family history), relationships, loss, abandonment, prejudice, competitiveness, selfworth, history, politics, mythology, literature, thriller-mystery aspects, womanhood, manhood, women in a field dominated by men, life challenges in general....love and all the complexities of love ( mixed with career passions). Ladies?.....what would you do if you were only one of three women at a large academic conference with other men? Would you purposely choose to hang around the other couple of women— or would you avoid them completely— why or why not? The book describe a scene that had me look at the situation very differently than what I thought I would normally have done.The reason I jumped to read this book now in the first place was because Catherine Chung’s book, “The Tenth Muse”, was chosen as our ‘book-of-the-year’....part of our local “Silicon Valley Reads”, program. I love finishing a book - ( that has much to examine), then going to a group talk after. Catherine was scheduled to be speaking at different venues and library’s all over town. I was looking forward to attending. But......all events have been canceled due to the coronavirus that has hit our area. Emergency declaration has been mandated: all mass gatherings are cancelled. Forty-five people have been confirmed ‘coronavirus-positive’, in my area. Increased numbers are anticipated. So....I won’t be hearing Catherine Chung speak about this book — but I definitely recommend reading it— reading it with a buddy would add value, too. It’s an overall great novel with much interest to keep any reading-junkie- in the 7th-heaven-unputdownable satiated zone! THIS IS HOW THIS BOOK BEGINS.... “Everyone knows that ONCE UPON A TIME there were nine muses. They were known as the daughters of Zeus, and wise men loved them, for they bestowed the gift of genius. ‘Sing in me O Muse’! cried Homer, and the muses answered: filling his voice and spinning out his mortal talents to make immortal tales”. “What not everyone knows is that once there existed another sister, who chose a different path. She was the youngest of them, and the most reckless, and when she came of age and it was time to claim and art, she shook her head, and she refused. She said she did not wish to sing in the voices of men, telling only the stories they wished to tell. She preferred to sing her songs herself”. Katherine grew up in a small town - New Umbria, Michigan in the 50’s.Asian, American, mixed race with Jewish blood, a math prodigy.She knew she was different and she knew what she was up against- She wanted what she wanted.... to be respected for her academic brilliance- and also — for her right to enjoy “being a girl”....( you can sing 🎶....”The Flower Girl Song”, now.....”I enjoy being a girl”!Point is —-she didn’t have to dress like a man, even though she was mostly and predominantly working along side more men than women. Wonderful - looking back - reflective story.... you’ll learn about Katherine’s coming of age, schools she attended,college, post graduate education, the background of Katherine’s parents, withheld secrets, legends, the brutal devastation that WWII was, goals, mistakes, regrets, dreams and hope....and the essence between math and love. Kudos to Catherine Chung. I really enjoyed her book - and hope to meet her here in the Bay Area one of these days.

What a beautiful and mesmerizing book. I didn't so much read it as get lost in it, finishing it in little more than a day. Katherine is a Mathemetician, professional, respected, and accomplished. In the novel she looks back on her life, particularly the early stages of her career which were inextricably bound up with the story of where she came from.In post-WWII America, numbers come naturally to Katherine from an early age, but the world of mathematics is never a natural fit. She is always the only woman, and almost always the only person who is not white (she's half white, half Chinese). The system is stacked against her in ways large and small, but despite her intelligence, she is not the kind of person who can use her confidence and boldness to push her forward against the tide. Some of her insecurity is natural, but much of it is tied deeply to the mother who abandoned her as a child. As she grows up, this gets even more complicated when she discovers that hardly anything she knows about her family is true. Katherine's journey searching for her own identity, her family, her history, and her career all end up coming to a head together.I have a particular soft spot for books about women in STEM and this one hit the spot. (It's the second 2019 release I've read and enjoyed, after LOST AND WANTED by Nell Freudenberger, about a female physicist and a difficult friendship.) It's clear Chung has dug deeply into Mathematics and that Katherine's brain hums with potential, but it also has the kind of family saga and historical drama you'd find in a book like PACHINKO. (If I was going to give this book as a mashup, it would be something like PACHINKO + Weike Wang's CHEMISTRY, books I both enjoyed very much but with very different styles, I see this one as melding them somewhat.) Deep and meaty enough topics about race, identity, and gender that it would be a perfect fit for any book club looking for a rewarding read.

“The Tenth Muse” by Catherine Chung narrated by Cassandra Campbell in the Audible production is an absorbing listen. Campbell’s voice is lyrical and serene. Chung is not only an author, but a mathematician as well. She combines her two strengths to create “The Tenth Muse”. Although math is almost a character of the novel, Chung brings in complex theorems and ideas and writes them simply so the nonmathematical can easily follow. Her main character is a woman who is gifted in mathematics in the 1960’s, when men dominated the field and women were not accepted as professional. This woman, Katherine, struggles to be true to herself and her abilities and navigate the tricky time period when teachers, scholars, and professionals did not recognize her gifts and disparaged her every accomplishment. Chung writes Katherine so realistically that I double-checked to see if this novel was based upon someone’s life. Chung weaves historical characters into Katherine’s life in such a way that it all seems plausible. It reads like an historical narrative of a female math protégée and her fight for validation.To add complexity to Katherine, Chung writes her family life as complicated, with a Chinese mother and an American father, living in Michigan in the 1940’s. Katherine being part Chinese at that time of American history was a burden. Being part Chinese and a woman at University, especially MIT was extraordinary. Was she shunned for being a female or for being Asian?All through the story, Katherine is obsessed with the Riemann Hypothesis. That thread binds the rest of the story of Katherine. It’s an amazing read of the frustrations women suffered in attaining acceptance in a male dominated field. It’s also a journey of Katherine’s origins. Who is she really?This is a beautiful literary novel that will stay with me for a long time. Katherine makes choices that I’m not sure I could make. It would be a fabulous book club read.

Bernhard Riemann, German mathematician, in 1859 proposed the Riemann hypothesis, which remains unsolved to this day. “In fact, the Clay Institute is offering $1 million to the person who solves it first.”This story is about a young ambitious woman who tries to solve the Riemann hypothesis. Set during a time when only men studied science and only men were given positions as professors. Katherine, the protagonist, is being told repeatedly that she could achieve so much if only she were a man.Katherine grew up in the 1940s and 1950s in the small town of New Umbria, Michigan. Even as a young girl she understood the power of what her mother was telling her, “that numbers underlay the mysteries of nature. That if you could unlock their secrets, you could catch a glimpse of the order within.”Her father refused to talk about the war or his experience in it. Her mother avoided talk about China where she was from. When it stormed, her curiosity led her to learn about protons and electrons. From her mother she learned that she could get closer to nature by learning how it worked.Her father sparked her interest in science, showing her little experiments. He involved her in his projects. At the same time, quizzing each other on Morse code and electrical principles. She receives scholarship from Purdue University against all odds. Her class on the first day is all male except her. And most of the time, she is the only woman in any math class.She is told, “If you were a man, you’d have a brilliant future ahead of you.”At the end, she is accepted to every graduate program she’d applied. It is then, when she first learns about the Riemann hypothesis.The story mentions many historical mathematicians and scientists and their achievements. It is very brief, thus enriching the story and not overwhelming it. While in Bonn, Katherine meets another woman scholar, but in quite different field of folklore. She is collecting folktales for her new book, revealing an interesting aspect of fairy tales collected by Grimm Brothers and changes they brought in their retelling. It is a very interesting read, bringing a little-known mathematical theory, intertwined with a compelling story of an ambitious woman who sets her goals very high; in a time when it’s not on her side and she needs to work double hard. She doesn’t necessarily reaches the very top, but what she also learns might be even more valuable to her, the self-discovery, the meaning of life.@FB/BestHistoricalFiction

Somehow, I'd always thought those were the two options available to me. The tenth muse gave up everything to claim her own voice. Kwan-Yin gave up everything on behalf of everyone else.4.5 stars. What a surprising novel! The writing style is intelligent, beautiful, crisp but very easy and accessible. The story is very textured with so many layers and genres included. I loved her descriptions of the science of mathematics - she made it sound like magic.The characters and the relationships felt very real, human and flawed. The WWII story line was beautifully and differently done, and touched me. Some of the other elements that made this book something special - the interesting historical figures, the myths and fables as well as the focus on feminism. I highly recommend this, especially if you enjoy books by Liz Moore.

It’s readable and smart. I loved it. Chapter 16 and its aftermath were distracting to me, though, and influenced my read of the novel as a whole. This chapter compresses the horrors of the lives of comfort women during WWII into a few unearned paragraphs, e.g. "The first time I saw her all her clothes hung off her shoulders in dirty rags...her eyes were two blackened shiny holes...I became half mad with desire for her…” "He put his sweating hand on the gash inside my thigh”… and then it leaps mid-chapter to an equally compressed and, in my view, unearned story about lives lost in the Holocaust...What are these melodramatic asides about WWII doing in this otherwise delicately told, true novel?Chung’s protagonist is an intelligent, thoughtful, and generous person, and all of the less melodramatic parts of her story were very fine. I wish Chung had trusted her core story to stand on its own, because it's a compassionate story about a woman of color who is a brilliant mathematician, and who strives to achieve the recognition she deserves in a racist and misogynistic world. I hope in some future novel Chung turns to the topic of comfort women, and gives their story the space and time they deserve. And I hope the next novel from this marvelous author will be a story that grows organically from her uniquely human characters.