Customer Reviews

Mind Bending Puzzles

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1 star:		(3)

 

 

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.

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.

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?

As I write this I am ripping the last page of my Mind-Bending Puzzles calendar for 2003.
The puzzles in 2003 are very weak; in fact they should be called questions. They are either too difficult to solve or too easy. Many solutions end with "Can you see other solutions?" and the answer is usually "yes, hundreds". With Multiple Choice questions it is often possible to justify all options.
There is nothing subtle about the questions; there is never an answer that makes you kick yourself.
Buy the Dilbert or Far Side Calendar instead.

As I write this I am ripping the last page of my Mind-Bending Puzzles calendar for 2003.
The puzzles in 2003 are very weak; in fact they should be called questions. They are either too difficult to solve or too easy. Many solutions end with "Can you see other solutions?" and the answer is usually "yes, hundreds". With Multiple Choice questions it is often possible to justify all options.
There is nothing subtle about the questions; there is never an answer that makes you kick yourself.
Buy the Dilbert or Far Side Calendar instead.