Hi guys, yes I did buy it and went through it from cover to cover. It does show a very different way of honing your basic skills in maths i.e. division, subtraction, multiplication, addition, squaring etc. However, using these methods in practical terms (by that I mean away from the examples it provides in the book) it was of little use. I was initially very impressed with the book but in the end found it very disappointing, for example it’s brilliant for questions such as 96 x 96 = 9216, where you are able to use 100 as a base number, for example:
96 x 96
(a) -4 -4
(b) 96 – 4 = 92 (your thousands and hundredths)
(C) 4x4 = 12 (your tens and units)
Answer 9216
a) you say 96 is below 100 by 4 units place them under the 96 on both sides, then
b) deduct one of 4’s (or any other number under the main number 96) which give you 92,
c) then multiply the numbers under the 96 so 4 x 4 = 16 and put on the end.
However, when doing sums like 43 x 76 the methods don’t work that well but there are ways of doing it. In the book he describes a method where you can use two base numbers here it becomes something like using base numbers 50 and 100.
The books downfalls really show up when trying to multiply massive numbers like 787 x 1675830 whereby the methods for base numbers as shown above just can’t work and therefore I found I had to resort to the old fashioned methods of multiplying individual numbers. Self admittedly I am pants at maths and was hoping this book would help, but I’m afraid it didn’t really cover all bases it only covered things up to a certain extent. It also lacks clear and through explanation in areas which may have helped the reader adapt the methods to their needs.
Hope this helps
Docash1983