A life of pure reason, or of dangerous passion? No middle course appeared to be available for Lord Byron's unhappy daughter, Ada (1815-1852), who channeled her brilliance into mathematical pursuits and wrote what is considered one of the world's first computer programs. Ada Byron, Lady Lovelace, never knew her father; her mother, convinced of her husband's moral depravity, fled from him just after the child was born and spent her life protecting Ada from his supposedly corrupting influence by forcing the girl into rigorous studies. Despite her formidable intellectual achievements, however, Ada was never fully able to reconcile her analytical mind with her unruly imagination and feelings. In this accessible biography--which follows at least three others published since 1977, now out of print or available only by special order--Woolley presents Ada as a symbol of her age, determined (but ultimately failing) to bridge the divide between Romantic excess and Victorian control. Subject to bouts of mania and depression and often physically ill, Ada struggled for recognition in a patriarchal society, refused to conform to accepted codes of social and sexual behavior, and insisted on the possibility of a "poetical science" that would unite reason with imagination. Woolley, who writes for the BBC, skillfully conveys the excitement and contradictions of the era, and builds maximum suspense into the book's episodic structure--an approach that serves well in this popular account of a complex life and time, even if it leaves unexplored too many questions about Ada's needs, motivations and constrained position in a male-dominated society. (Jan.) Forecast: Books about daughters of great figures (e.g., Galileo's Daughter and Einstein's Daughter) have been popular of late, and Ada is as fascinating a daughter as ever was born. This book is a natural for handselling, not only to the literati interested in all things Byronic, but to cyber-folk, many of whom will be aware of Ada's early work in computers (the U.S. Dept. of Defense named its computer language "Ada" in her honor), and even to the SF crowd, cultivated for this story through William Gibson and Bruce Sterling's classic The Difference Engine. (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

This biography of Ada Lovelace, best known for her 1843 paper about Charles Babbage's famous Analytical Engine (sometimes mistakenly called the first computer), is aptly titled Romance, Reason and Byron's Daughter, since these words supply the themes that constitute the tale. Focusing principally on the fact that Ada was the daughter of George Gordon, Lord Byron, British historian Woolley creates a heroine who was torn between the Romantic impulses of her father and the stern, repressive upbringing of a mother who was determined to make her daughter conform to reason. The author is frank in admitting that where evidence was lacking, he engaged in inferred speculation, and he weaves an enthralling and accessible saga. There is very little here about Ada's scientific contribution, her lucid and informed account of the significance of Babbage's machine and how it worked, but there is a great deal about her personal life and her inner struggles between her sexual and her scientific desires. Students and scholars who wish to place this woman in the history of scientific or technological thought will be frustrated, but the general reader may well enjoy its romantic presentation. M. H. Chaplin Wellesley College

First published in the United Kingdom in 1999, this is an entertaining biography of Augusta Ada Byron Lovelace, daughter of the renowned poet Lord Byron. Separated from Lord Byron shortly after Ada's birth, Lady Bryon raised her daughter in a strange and thoroughly controlled manner, limiting her access to both people and intellectual pursuits in order to keep Ada from developing any of the shortcomings she might have inherited from her father. As a result, Ada, who suffered from a variety of legitimate health problems, also developed serious psychological problems. As directed by her mother, Ada's educational focus was on science, and her relationship with Charles Babbage and the work she did in explaining and interpreting his Analytical Engine and Difference Machine, a precursor of the computer, were the culmination of her mathematical and technical studies. A fine study of Ada, this book is as much about her mother, Annabella, a woman who would not be crossed and who dominated her daughter's life right up to Ada's death at age 37. There is much controversy associated with Ada's life, and Woolley (Virtual Worlds) deals with it openly and philosophically. Some of his interpretations will surely be questioned, but for a biography filled with "sex, drugs, and mathematics" this is to be expected. Readers who enjoyed Dava Sobel's Galileo's Daughter will find this interesting.Hilary Burton, Lawrence Livermore National Lab, CA(c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.