" . . . a wonderful addition to any mathematics teacher's professional bookshelf." --The Mathematics Teacher

"The individual biographies themselves make for enthralling, often inspiring, reading . . . this volume should be compelling reading for women mathematics students and professionals. A fine addition to the literature on women in science . . . Highly recommended." --Choice

". . . it makes an important contribution to scholarship on the interrelations of gender, mathematics, and culture in the U.S. in the second half of the twentieth century." --Notices of the AMS

"Who is the audience for this book? Certainly women who are interested in studying mathematics and women already in mathematics who have become discouraged will find much to interest and help them. Faculty who teach such women would put it to good use. But it would be a loss to relegate the book to a shelf for occasional reference to an interested student or beginning mathematician. Everyone in the mathematics community in which each of Henrion's subjects struggled so hard to find a place could benefit by a thoughtful reading." --Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM) News

Mathematics is often described as the purest of the sciences, the least tainted by subjective or cultural influences. Theoretically, the only requirement for a life of mathematics is mathematical ability. And yet we see very few women mathematicians. Why?

Based upon a series of ten intensive interviews with prominent women mathematicians throughout the United States, this book investigates the role of gender in the complex relationship between mathematician, the mathematical community, and mathematics itself.