Mind Bending Puzzles [Calendar]

Cliff Pickover (Author)

Product Details

• Calendar
• Publisher: Pomegranate Communications (June 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 076492303X
• ISBN-13: 978-0764923036
• Product Dimensions: 7.1 x 6.1 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #8,357,776 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fun, thought-provoking, January 4, 2004

By 

Marge Reynolds (San Antonio, Texas) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Mind Bending Puzzles (Calendar)

I found this calendar to be even better than previous ones by the author. Some puzzles involve a bit of mathematics. Some are zany and fun. Some involve words. Some make me laugh.
Instructive, provocative, addictive, and fun.

They are especially useful in the classroom or even at parties. I've taken the first five puzzles from the calendar and distributed them to my classroom. That really gets the students mind in gear.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One extra day in 2004., December 16, 2003

By 

Paul Moskowitz (Yorktown, NY) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Mind Bending Puzzles (Calendar)

Most desk calendars for 2004 are pitched as "365-day" calendars. However, Pickover gives us more. His is a 366-day calendar. We do indeed get a 29th day of February in 2004!

This desk calendar measures 6.25 x 5.25 inches. Each page has a puzzle at the top of the page, but leaves lots of room for notes. The puzzles display the classic Pickover genius. They are shorter versions of the puzzles that you might find in his mathematics books. There are anagrams, cryptograms, and mathematical puzzles. Fortunately, solutions are included. My favorite anagram is one that appeared in 2002: "Name the famous blond singer who claims to like Presbyterians." Hint: The answer is not Madonna, but they are kissing cousins.

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars A Let Down, March 29, 2004

By 

Traveller - See all my reviews

This review is from: Mind Bending Puzzles (Calendar)

In my opinion, the best puzzles in this book are the anagrams - normally I'm not very good at this kind of puzzle, but I can solve these. I was disappointed by the rest of the content, though. I was hoping for puzzles I could solve with logic, but instead I found puzzles that were, in my opinion, ridiculous, such as the following from February 19th:

"What is the next word in this strange sequence?

Moose, ape, rooster, tiger, insect, ape, nerve, spider, ape, rooster, egg, cricket, ox, oxen, ?

Choose from:

lion, trilobite, rhombus, rooster, gazelle"

Stumped?

So was I. And I wanted my money back after I read the solution:

"The answer is lion. The first letters of each word spell out a sentence: Martians are cool."

...Need I say more?