Customer Reviews

Expert Sudoku

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I have done most of the super difficult sudoku books, and they were getting boring. Then I found this book (I was aware that Nikoli does human-made puzzles). I've solved over 100 of the puzzles, all without having to do a full mark-up, and I have loved every one of them. The puzzle-makers are correct that human-made puzzles lead you on an interesting path, while computer-made puzzles lead you to a single point of difficulty, followed by an uninteresting denouement. No, these puzzles are definitely not easy. But they allow you to follow logical steps to a conclusion. Try them. You might be excited about them!

I've been doing Sudoku for several years but this was the first book that allowed me to appreciate the "elegance" of the puzzle. Yes, these puzzles are challenging but after completing a few I knew that if I persisted in my efforts with the others I would succeed. Often, doing computer-generated puzzles I felt that I was being unfairly taken advantage of by being tangled in an unsolvable maze of possibilities that only a high-powered computer could create and solve. Thanks to Nikoli Publishers for putting the "human" touch into hand-made Sudokus.

I have really enjoyed working the puzzles in this book. Time to work each puzzle varied from about 15 minutes to a couple of hours. Sometimes i just got lucky with what jumped up at me first and other times I would have to put the book down and come back to it in order to solve. Several times I made mistakes that I just couldn't seem to get corrected without cheating. So all in all I thought it was a great book.

Very challenging and the good part is it does away with the easy and med.puzzle. Great book for the deep thinker.

I found these puzzles don't measure up to the cover's description. I would rate these moderate at most, not difficult; and 'expert' is definitely saying too much! I would not have spent the money if i knew beforehand that the puzzles would be only moderately challenging -- it does not live up to the cover's claims. If you are looking for something truly 'expert', I would pass this one by.

I have now over 4 years been solving Sudokus bout for relaxing and for brain training. First starting on this after over some ears in the newspapers having been seen Sudukos. And then 3 years ago after having had an accident so that I can not yet use the right hand, and besides at the same time in the engineering news reading about Sudoku. At there being that Suduko is the best found for the brain.

In Amazon a few month ago I ordered this book after having read 2 recommendations for it. In the previous 3 years I by Amazon have bought nearly 20 books with Sudoku, and am looking after the most difficult. The books with Sudoku puzzles that I until now have found best are books by Will Shoertz, last bought the "Hot Sudoky", and the most difficult one from Mensa, the "Absolutely Nasty Sudoku" level 4.

And most of the puzzles in these books I find more difficult than these in "Expert Sudoku". That is among other because for nearly all of the puzzles in the Expert Sudoky there are many possibility for solving from the start, compared to the puzzles in most of the other here mentioned books. In these other books there again and again are only possibility for doing the next step..

But concerning the puzzles in "Expert Suduko" each of these have taking me les than 30 minutes, and that including by putting in the actual puzzle on my PCs screen, including using one color for the known numbers and another color for the found numbers, one by one after having teen found.

Maybe I have become too good to Suduko, but the 3 examples from the International Suduko Competition shown in the engineering news 3 years ago, each of them took me hours. So I'm now looking after books with puzzles having difficulty closer to these. I know that I can find puzzles like these in Google, but preferring having them in books I have by hand and easily can copy in on the screen and then can continue solving when I have time. And then again after years can solve them again, on a new made file, and later compare if I the second time solved them better than the first time. I use some marks so that I can see nearly square by square, number by number, how the single puzzles were solved by me.