Customer Reviews

Perplexing Puzzles and Tantalizing Teasers (Dover Children's Activity Books)

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I was so glad to find that this book is still in print. It was wonderful and challenging and great fun to figure out some of the problems, learn a different way of looking at things, stretching your imagination... It taught me that things aren't always the way they appear to be. It taught me to think for myself and I used it over and over again, exercising the mind muscle. I lost mine from 25 years ago, and its one of the books that has stood out from my childhood. Now I'm thrilled to find I can still get a copy for my son and a few copies as unique gifts. Its not like any other childrens book I've seen.

Perplexing Puzzles and Tantalizing Teasers will definitely test your wits and best of all, it'll test your common sense. You'll realize common sense is not so common after all! The book is also full of word games, visual games, conundrums, jokes, palindromes, and some real stumpers. I was given my first copy 18 years ago, and I've been hooked ever since. The illustrations are great; and if you can't figure something out, the answer is always in the back.

This book is a bonanza of puzzles, riddles, and questions with an emphasis on humor. Two great volumes bound as one. Put together they account for 93 stimulating brainteasers ideal for strengthening young mental muscles. Ridiculous riddles, tantalizing teasers, intricate mazes, deceptive illusions, tricky questions, and a host of unusual word and picture puzzle will offer your kids many hours of challenging fun. All the solutions are given at the back of the book.

This curious and comic collection is the perfect companion for car trips, parties, picnics, or those long rainy days.

Great for my seven-year old grandson who loves puzzles, jokes and riddles. While much in this book is above him at the moment, he will grow into it. And what he can do now, is challenging and completely engaging. He especially liked a puzzle that asked him to find the differences between two drawings. Unlike the usual challenge in this type of exercise, the two drawings were mirror images where he had to distinguish between things on the left reflected as things on the right. He loved it!

9-12 years old is just right for this book. Some of the puzzles seem overly simple, but for the most part they were just challenging enough. Throughout the book there are puzzles that have a surprising twist or are satisfyingly tricky, making this book worth a look.

My grandkids love this book and spend alot of time in it.
A great summertime activity when it's too hot to go outside.

Martin Gardner was the most influential member of the mathematical community in the twentieth century. His "Mathematical Recreations" columns in Scientific American remain the gold standard of expository mathematics and I have yet to meet a mathematician that did not read at least some of his work. Gardner was also a creator and collector of puzzles, which are the contents of this book.
If you are a veteran puzzler, then many of those in this book will be familiar to you. A few are classics, such as the rearrangement of toothpicks to make entirely different shapes. Others are a bit different, having that distinctive Gardner touch and solutions to all are included at the end. None of them is particularly hard, just a tad clever in presentation.

I loved this book when I was younger and now my sons are really enjoying this book. It is a fun book that requires them to think and analyze. Great for the car and when you are waiting somewhere-keeps my 10 and 11 years occupied.

I received this book for Christmas one year many, many years ago and loved the puzzles and riddles. A couple of months ago it popped into my head and I found it on Amazon and thought it would be a great book for my kids. They are roughly the same age now as when I first received it. After prying the iTouch and the DSis and the laptops out of their technologically addicted hands I got them to look at it. They spun it around a couple of times looking for the power switch but after determining that it was, in fact, a book, they figured out how to "activate" it.

They seem to really like it. I still love going back and trying to figure out some of the puzzlers.

Old School Thinking at its best.

Martin Gardner is the best and most entertaining puzzler around. You will enjoy this book.