A History of Pi covers the development of Pi as a mathematical concept and efforts to calculate it. The author has a certain contempt for people who have sought the value beyond ten places, but most of the book covers that very topic. While reading I recalled trying horribly ineffective methods of calculating Pi back in college (e.g. Monte Carlo). Little did I know that people had hand calculated Pi to 500 digits as early as 1855. There is some interesting discussion of Euler, Newton, a few other important mathematicians. All-in-all a very dry read, but that doesn't surprise you does it.