Customer Reviews

Brainteasers and Mindbenders

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When I first opened this book of 365 puzzles (yes, one for each day of the year) back when it was originally published (1981), little did I realize that I'd still be reading it almost 20 years later! The puzzles (created by Ben Hamilton, one of Britain's most respected puzzlemakers and the former Puzzles Editor for the monthly "Games and Puzzles" magazine) are short and concise in presentation, and are fun to solve. There are a variety of word, math, and logic puzzles to keep you from getting bored. Similarly, the puzzles range in difficulty so readers of all ages can enjoy this collection. The only weak point to this book is that while all the answers are provided, they tend to simply state the solution without reviewing the logic or mathematical proof, so if you don't know HOW to solve the problem, the solutions won't help much. Still, it is an indespensible and enjoyable collection of marvelous puzzles -- one that will likely stay on your bookshelf as long as it has on mine.

Like climbing mountains, puzzle solving is all about the effort in getting there. Once you reach the top, it all looks so easy, especially when you can see the smooth slope on the other side that would have been so much easier. A puzzle is like that, in that after you have the solution, it is obvious.
This collection primarily contains puzzles of a type that can be considered oldies but goodies. The primary categories are letter rearrangements, finding words or names embedded in phrases, fill in the blank letters to create specific phrases, finding words, phrase recognition and number manipulation. There are 365 puzzles, one listed for each day of the year, although few if any are related to their day and solutions to all are included at the end.
The puzzles vary enormously in difficulty. Some I solved in seconds, and others totally stumped me, at least until I looked at the solution, which caused me to immediately whack my forehead. In general, I found the number manipulation problems to be easy and the word scramble puzzles to be hard. Your opinion of this collection will largely depend on your experience with puzzles. If you have a lot, you may fly through most of them, but if you are a novice, you most likely will struggle, although it will be well worth it.

The first time I read this book, I found the puzzles very challenging; some, in fact, were very difficult. I re-read the book a few weeks later and found, however, the puzzles were not as difficult as I recalled. I was really disappointed by my third and fourth reading - the puzzles were not challenging at all!

A good book overall, but either I got a lot smarter during the three months I read and re-reread this book (I been taking flaxseed oil daily, which may explain this), or the publishers have devised some way to revise the book while it is in my possession.

Gee Golly, When I fist started reading this book I thought well golly gee I must be in heaven. Later on I founed out that I wasnt, but It sure felt like it You shoul Read it.