Quanta Books

07/06/2026

The programming language Lean is “at the heart of the AI model training ecosystem,” shaping how the latest cutting-edge technology teaches itself to solve problems. But how did Lean come to be? Kevin Hartnett’s new title, THE PROOF IN CODE, has answers.

Tune into the full interview at the Simons Foundation (Simons Foundation) and order the book at the link in our bio!

07/02/2026

What are the technologies driving the AI revolution in math? Kevin Hartnett, author of THE PROOF IN THE CODE, draws illuminating parallels between computer programming and math proofs in a talk at the Simons Foundation. Watch the whole interview and order the book at the links in our bio!

05/27/2026

The programming language and math proof assistant Lean is the latest tool in a millennia-long search to discover and verify the truth.

In the fourth and third century BCE, early proofs by Aristotle and Euclid laid the groundwork for rigorously verifying mathematics. Later, Gottfried Leibniz, Bertrand Russell, Alfred North Whitehead, and Kurt Gödel sought the truth by representing math as a formalized, rational, symbolic language that could be objectively evaluated. If all of mathematics builds on solid foundations, they thought, you could in principle construct an edifice to answer the field’s most important, unsolved questions.

Today, Lean continues this legacy of truth-seeking, giving mathematicians a powerful, interactive tool with which to fulfill Gödel’s dreams of “prov[ing] any theorem using nothing but a few mechanical rules.”

Learn more in Kevin Hartnett’s THE PROOF IN THE CODE, publishing June 9. Preorder your copy here: https://www.quantabooks.org/books/the-proof-in-the-code/

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Image credits (from left): Wellcome Collection gallery, Photo Researchers—Science History Images/Alamy, Christoph Bernhard Francke, Keystone France/Getty Images, Hulton Archive/Getty Images, Alfred Eisenstaedt/The Life Picture Collection/Getty Images.

03/18/2026

“A fascinating example of how cultural clashes and creativity can create new paradigms . . . [In THE PROOF IN THE CODE], proofs, personalities, and machines collide—intriguingly—at the uneasy intersection of mathematics and computer science.’” — Kirkus

Excited to share our first trade review for Kevin Hartnett’s debut! Check it out here: https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/kevin-hartnett/the-proof-in-the-code/

THE PROOF IN THE CODE publishes June 9, 2026, and is available for preorder here: https://www.quantabooks.org/books/the-proof-in-the-code/

03/10/2026

In our newest edition of Philomath, we offer a glimpse behind the scenes at Quanta Books: how we think about incoming submissions, what we’re looking for in a book proposal, and some of our favorite science books. We also share a new website update! You can now browse our current titles, learn how to submit queries and proposals, and read more about our imprint and our mission.

Check it out here: https://mailchi.mp/066f700b557f/quanta-books-479?e=c8eee27783

To stay up to date on new titles, events, and author news, subscribe to our newsletter here (https://www.quantabooks.org/) or join us on LinkedIn here (https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/philomath-7427754066820259842/) and let us know your thoughts in the comment section.

Say you’ve got an idea for the perfect science book. You know the subject inside out and you know how you want to write about it. Now what?

02/10/2026

New cover alert! We’re excited to reveal the cover for Terence Tao’s new book, SIX MATH ESSENTIALS. ​​Available now for preorder here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374621797/sixmathessentials/. Expect it on shelves October 27, 2026. Huge thanks to Na Kim at Farrar, Straus and Giroux for this design—an elegant cover for an elegant book. To learn more about SIX MATH ESSENTIALS, or any of our other forthcoming titles, visit our site at quantabooks.org

12/09/2025

Exciting news: In early 2027, we’ll be publishing leading theoretical physicist David Tong’s EVERYTHING IS FIELDS. A quantum field theorist at the University of Cambridge and the author of the recently published Lectures on Theoretical Physics series from Cambridge University Press, Tong is a renowned science communicator. Through humor, history, and vivid metaphor, he brings physics to life. His public talks on quantum fields [ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNVQfWC_evg ] have collected millions of views, and his freely available lecture notes [ https://www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/user/tong/teaching.html ] and talks are classics among amateur dabblers and serious physicists alike.

In EVERYTHING IS FIELDS, Tong takes us on a lively tour through quantum field theory, the underlying mathematical framework of the Standard Model—what Tong calls the “Greatest Theory of All Time.” The Standard Model, our best and deepest description of the fundamental laws of physics, reveals a startling truth: that, at our most basic level, we are made not of particles or forces, but fields, fluid-like substances stretched throughout the entire universe. With infectious enthusiasm, Tong buoys our journey through the most difficult topic in theoretical physics, helping us build an intuition for how “the basic ingredients of our best current laws of physics” work. He revels in all that we’ve learned about our world and illuminates the questions that we’re still trying to answer about the stuff that makes up you, me, and everything else.

To learn more about EVERYTHING IS FIELDS, visit us at quantabooks.org.

12/08/2025

We’re thrilled to announce that Quanta Books will be publishing Terence Tao’s SIX MATH ESSENTIALS in November 2026. The recipient of a Fields Medal, a MacArthur Fellowship, and a Breakthrough Prize in Mathematics, Tao is one of the world’s most decorated and prolific mathematicians, as well as a generous, wide-ranging communicator who aims to make math accessible. We’re honored to be launching his first book for a general audience.

In SIX MATH ESSENTIALS, Tao introduces readers to six core ideas that have guided mathematicians from antiquity to the frontiers of what we know today. This elegant volume explores numbers as the gateway to quantitative thinking, algebra as the gateway to abstraction, geometry as a way to go beyond what we can see, probability as a tool to navigate uncertainty with rigorous thinking, analysis as a means to tame the very large or very small, and dynamics as the mathematics of change. SIX MATH ESSENTIALS offers a glimpse into the workings of an incomparable mind and how he thinks about the beauty and interconnectedness of the mathematical enterprise. Ultimately, Tao reveals that mathematics, at its core, is a fundamentally creative project, one that seeks to explore all “theoretical, possible worlds.” Contrary to popular perception, math isn’t magic—it’s a powerful way of thinking that anyone can learn.

To learn more about SIX MATH ESSENTIALS, visit us at quantabooks.org.

11/13/2025

We’re thrilled to reveal the cover for our imprint’s debut, Kevin Hartnett’s THE PROOF IN THE CODE (coming June 9, 2026), now available for preorder! Shoutout to the design team at Farrar, Straus and Giroux for the mesmerizing design. Want a copy of your own? You can now preorder here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374620059/theproofinthecode/. For more information, visit our website here: www.quantabooks.org.