Lauren Ipsum

Lauren Ipsum

by Carlos Bueno, illustrated by Miran Lipovača

One day, Lauren Ipsum - Laurie to her friend - got lost in the forest by her house. As she tried to find her way home, she instead found herself in a strange new place populated by Jargons, Elegants, Mailer Daemons, and talking Turtles (Green Round animals with a Shell) called Userland. Before long, she'd met the Wandering Salesman (who must visit all the towns in Userland without repeating his path), discussed infinity with Achilles and a Turtle (exploring Xeno's famous paradox), befriended a talking logic gate lizard called Xor, played the Game of Life, and helped build a binary semaphore network, expanding her own abilities along the way and discovering the difference between a solution that makes sense and a sensible solution.

Carlos Bueno's allegorical tale Lauren Ipsum is reminiscent of The Phantom Tollbooth, but with a focus on logic and computer science instead of words and grammar. Without getting bogged down in minutia, Bueno guides the engaged reader through major concepts of computer science including algorithms, recursion, binary search, abstractions, and many more. Bueno has a light touch and uses the Socratic method to good effect, asking leading questions and guiding the reader to the solution, without being (obviously) didactic. He builds on prior concepts and subtly teaches logic, without once actually mentioning computers.

Beautifully illustrated by Miran Lipovača, Lauren Ipsum is a great way to encourage a young person (or even an old person) to think about how computers work. I can't recommend it highly enough.

Lauren Ipsum
by Carlos Bueno, illustrated by Miran Lipovača