Question

If Mark reads 18 pages less than originally planned, he will need 5 more days to complete the book. If he reads 24 pages less than originally planned, he will need 8 more days to finish. How many pages are in the book?

Answer 1

Answer: Let's denote the original number of pages Mark planned to read as "P".

From the first statement, we know that P - 18 pages will take 5 more days, which means P pages will take 5 days less, or 5 - 5 = 0 days.

From the second statement, we know that P - 24 pages will take 8 more days, which means P pages will take 8 days less, or 8 - 8 = 0 days.

So, we have two equations:

P - 18 = 5 * X

P - 24 = 8 * Y

Where X and Y are the number of pages Mark reads per day.

Since X and Y are equal, we can substitute one of them for the other:

P - 18 = 5 * (P - 24) / 8

Expanding the right side and solving for P, we find that P = 288 pages.

Explanation: