Author website: https://mbreed.co.uk

Perhaps the most defining moment of my life was at my birth. Not the process itself, of which I remember very little, but the fact that it occurred in 1950. Meaning that the 1960s was the decade of my adolescence, in tandem with that of Britain itself. From a post-war (sweets were still rationed) regimented monochrome society where everyone knew their place, and looked up to their elders and betters (the aristocrats who ran the country), through the burgeoning rebellion of youth (teddy boys, mods and rockers), and into Swinging London and the psychedelic explosion of 1968, the year I went to university. I have tried to describe this in the early chapters of my novels.

At university (see photo), when not pretending to study mathematics, I had plenty of time for extra-curricular activities. In the Libertarian Group we argued about Bakunin and Kropotkin, and welcomed talks by Stuart Christie on the Angry Brigade, and Satish Kumar on peace and love. I founded the 38th July Movement and joined in the occupation of the Arts Block.

I graduated in 1971, and my – and Britain’s – cultural life went downhill.

If this were the plot of a novel, I’d now reveal the overriding ambition which motivated all my later actions. But like most people I have instead drifted through life, until I now look back with a brain dump of disjointed memories and a bucketful of regrets, wondering where all those irretrievable years have gone.

In the '70s and '80s, as a maths lecturer, I taught in universities in Lesotho, Swaziland, Papua New Guinea, Johannesburg, Dar-es-Salaam and Uxbridge. I also travelled around Eastern Europe: Czechoslovakia and East Germany, even getting married there. I am writing a biographical blog, titled A Life Dismembered, on my website. For information about my maths research and publications, see there and under my pen name Martin B Reed..

Since retiring from the University of Bath in 2019 I have begun writing novels and stories in the Pentacle Papers series of alternative history techno-thrillers. In my lectures I had enjoyed lightening the science with anecdotes and humour – now I enjoy doing the reverse in my fiction.

Author's website: https://mbreed.co.uk

Since graduating with a 2:1 in Mathematics from the University of East Anglia in 1971 (see photo): have taught at universities both overseas (Germany, Lesotho, Swaziland, Papua New Guinea) and in Britain (Oxford, Brunel, Bath). I completed a PhD in numerical analysis at Bath in 1980. My research interests are in numerical analysis, specifically finite element methods, quasi-Newton methods, and most recently in genetic and evolutionary computation. You can read more about my mathematics research and publications on my website. I retired from the University of Bath in 2018.

I have always been passionate about communicating mathematics to students in interesting, amusing ways which show them that maths is not as difficult or scary as they might imagine. That it can even be fun. My communication skills were helped by having to explain analysis in German in Hamburg, and during a contract as a Teacher of English as a Foreign Language in Bournemouth.

I published my textbook 'Core Maths for the Biosciences' with Oxford University Press in 2011, with students commenting "Easy to understand, interactive and dictated in a way that seemed as though you were almost having a conversation with the author." I am now working on a follow-up textbook for OUP.

Since retiring I have been able to pursue a long-held dream of writing novels which also incorporate maths and science, in an entertaining story. 'The Hammond Conjecture' combines my interests in Forbidden History, 20th Century politics, espionage, neuroscience and quantum mechanics, in a comic thriller format. For more information check my pen name M B Reed.