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The World's Biggest Book of Brainteasers & Logic Puzzles
What a bargain! At more than 700 puzzle-packed pages, this huge, value-priced collection should keep any solver happy...and busy for a very long time. It contains brain-busting challenges of almost every type: math logic problems for the numerically inclined; absolutely amazing lateral thinking conundrums; really great critical thinking bafflers; and mind-boggling word puzzles.
Here’s just a small sample of what’s inside: The 22nd and 24th presidents of the United States had the same mother and the same father, but were not brothers. How could this be so? Stumped? That’s because it’s one man—Grover Cleveland—who was reelected after skipping a term. And that’s just an easy warm-up!
Here’s just a small sample of what’s inside: The 22nd and 24th presidents of the United States had the same mother and the same father, but were not brothers. How could this be so? Stumped? That’s because it’s one man—Grover Cleveland—who was reelected after skipping a term. And that’s just an easy warm-up!
704 pages, Paperback
First published October 28, 2006
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
July 4, 2023
This is a mostly okay but not exciting collection of various types of puzzles, from "logic" puzzles that require deducing who is telling the truth to word puzzles to straight up math to lateral thinking puzzles, etc. Whatever type of puzzle you like, there's bound to be at least one in this book.
Full disclosure: at the time of this writing,* I am about a third of the way through the puzzles, starting from the first and working my way through all of them. However, I find this a bit taxing to enjoy, because many of the puzzles involve sitting down with pencil and paper (or even a spreadsheet) to solve, and at least two of them that I didn't flat out skip when the puzzle just sounded like advanced math homework didn't have the solution in the back. For instance:
"THE WORLD'S MOST NEARLY IMPOSSIBLE BRAIN BAFFLER, SIXTY-THREE
Noting that the [spoiler] can be placed uniquely, the full array is soon easily figured out, as shown."
(nothing else is shown)
I have used the clue to get most of the way there, only to end up in several dead ends and wanted to see where I was going wrong, but the complete answer JUST ISN'T THERE.
Two puzzles earlier is a 3x3 crossword, but it also leaves out the complete solution, opting to only explain one set of the 5 clues. While it's simple enough to solve if you've gotten that far, it's still irritating not to be able to confirm "A-HA, I SOLVED IT!" but to instead suppose your answer is correct or at least close enough.
On a more subjective note: the collection begins by describing an alien planet called Dranac where there are creatures called Duplgooses, whose eggs have been stolen. None of that is relevant to the puzzle, and it could have more concisely explained that there are four suspects accused of stealing a thing, followed by the statements from each. The challenge of some of the puzzles lies in deciphering the core puzzle from the flavour text, which I don't really like.
Also, lateral thinking puzzles in general feel like they are often too open-ended to guess the "real" solution, but one in particular describes a couple who *spoiler* basically commit child neglect, which is a pretty horrific puzzle answer. I like to feel smart when I solve a puzzle (or at least feel like the author came up with a clever answer). When the solution makes me feel icky or disgusted, it's not a good puzzle.
Similarly, one puzzle describes a man being on essentially a deathtrap island, one end of which is on fire, and he can't escape because, somehow, it's in shark-infested water with no boats and sheer cliffs instead of beach and how is it possible to even get oneself into this kind of situation? Regardless of the feasibility of the answer, I can't get past the premise of the puzzle to accept the solution.
To be fair, the odd puzzle here and there is clever, but I have a hard time recommending a book with a couple of good puzzles hiding in a sea of mediocre-to-terrible ones. Might be a good way to kill (a LOT of) time, but there are probably better books you could try instead.
Edit: I have now come to a puzzle that asks if you can divide a square into five rectangles of specific dimensions, and when I checked the answer, the entirety was, "Yes, there are two possible ways." ...NOT HELPFUL
Edit 2: I have now come to a puzzle that asks if you can arrange four digits (1, 5, 6, and 7) and any number of the symbols + - × / to total 21. The answer?
6 € (1 - 5€7) = 21
I mean, even if this were a "trick" answer using a combination of the left parenthesis and minus signs to make the Euro symbol, the parenthesis is not specified, nor am I able to parse how the function works. It might as well be a statement declaring the cure for cancer is to get a purple sun and fly it to Venus. Okay, I have no way to prove or disprove that I guess?? Dropping a star for being obtuse and/or bad at proofreading.
*taken from my 2018 review
Full disclosure: at the time of this writing,* I am about a third of the way through the puzzles, starting from the first and working my way through all of them. However, I find this a bit taxing to enjoy, because many of the puzzles involve sitting down with pencil and paper (or even a spreadsheet) to solve, and at least two of them that I didn't flat out skip when the puzzle just sounded like advanced math homework didn't have the solution in the back. For instance:
"THE WORLD'S MOST NEARLY IMPOSSIBLE BRAIN BAFFLER, SIXTY-THREE
Noting that the [spoiler] can be placed uniquely, the full array is soon easily figured out, as shown."
(nothing else is shown)
I have used the clue to get most of the way there, only to end up in several dead ends and wanted to see where I was going wrong, but the complete answer JUST ISN'T THERE.
Two puzzles earlier is a 3x3 crossword, but it also leaves out the complete solution, opting to only explain one set of the 5 clues. While it's simple enough to solve if you've gotten that far, it's still irritating not to be able to confirm "A-HA, I SOLVED IT!" but to instead suppose your answer is correct or at least close enough.
On a more subjective note: the collection begins by describing an alien planet called Dranac where there are creatures called Duplgooses, whose eggs have been stolen. None of that is relevant to the puzzle, and it could have more concisely explained that there are four suspects accused of stealing a thing, followed by the statements from each. The challenge of some of the puzzles lies in deciphering the core puzzle from the flavour text, which I don't really like.
Also, lateral thinking puzzles in general feel like they are often too open-ended to guess the "real" solution, but one in particular describes a couple who *spoiler* basically commit child neglect, which is a pretty horrific puzzle answer. I like to feel smart when I solve a puzzle (or at least feel like the author came up with a clever answer). When the solution makes me feel icky or disgusted, it's not a good puzzle.
Similarly, one puzzle describes a man being on essentially a deathtrap island, one end of which is on fire, and he can't escape because, somehow, it's in shark-infested water with no boats and sheer cliffs instead of beach and how is it possible to even get oneself into this kind of situation? Regardless of the feasibility of the answer, I can't get past the premise of the puzzle to accept the solution.
To be fair, the odd puzzle here and there is clever, but I have a hard time recommending a book with a couple of good puzzles hiding in a sea of mediocre-to-terrible ones. Might be a good way to kill (a LOT of) time, but there are probably better books you could try instead.
Edit: I have now come to a puzzle that asks if you can divide a square into five rectangles of specific dimensions, and when I checked the answer, the entirety was, "Yes, there are two possible ways." ...NOT HELPFUL
Edit 2: I have now come to a puzzle that asks if you can arrange four digits (1, 5, 6, and 7) and any number of the symbols + - × / to total 21. The answer?
6 € (1 - 5€7) = 21
I mean, even if this were a "trick" answer using a combination of the left parenthesis and minus signs to make the Euro symbol, the parenthesis is not specified, nor am I able to parse how the function works. It might as well be a statement declaring the cure for cancer is to get a purple sun and fly it to Venus. Okay, I have no way to prove or disprove that I guess?? Dropping a star for being obtuse and/or bad at proofreading.
*taken from my 2018 review
Displaying 1 of 1 review