One Man's Quest to Solve the Most Baffling Puzzles Ever, from Crosswords to Jigsaws to the Meaning of Life
February 14, 2022
“Puzzles are not a waste of time. Doing puzzles can make us better thinkers, more creative, more incisive, more persistent,” argues journalist and avid puzzler Jacobs (The Know-It-All) in this riveting cultural analysis. Showcasing his knack for immersive detail with fascinating takes on crosswords, jigsaws, and secret codes, he makes a convincing case that, beyond helping “stav off dementia” (which, he writes, there’s “mild evidence” for), puzzles can make people more evolved humans by requiring them to adopt “a mindset of ceaseless curiosity about everything in the world.” For centuries, he writes, anagrams have fueled humans’ obsessions with hidden meanings—Galileo loved them so much that he hid his discoveries in anagrammatic poems. And visual puzzles, such as Where’s Waldo, encourage people to question their first impressions and examine their surroundings more closely. Jacobs enriches his narrative with interviews with puzzle designers and devotees, along with accounts of his attending several puzzle tournaments—among them a jigsaw championship in Spain where he proudly placed “second to last.” The inclusion of tools to crack the code to all sorts of puzzles, and a section of original work by famed puzzler Greg Pliska, only add to the infectious charm. A rallying cry for “word nerds” everywhere, this is a delight.
March 1, 2022
This multifaceted memoir explores Jacobs's (Thanks a Thousand) personal relationship with puzzles but also discusses the broader history (and controversies) of puzzles. Jacobs is himself a crossword enthusiast, but for this book he branches out to research puzzles outside his wheelhouse (math and word puzzles; Rubik's Cubes; mazes; riddles) and engagingly interviews puzzle experts. He also offers his own theories as to why people love to puzzle and why the English language works so well for word puzzles. This book shines for its interactive format, featuring more than 100 historical puzzles, plus 10 original puzzles created for the book by Greg Pliska (hints and solutions are included). It also offers a challenge: Jacobs has hidden a secret puzzle in the book and says that the first reader to solve it will win a cash prize of $10,000. VERDICT A fun, interactive exploration of the history and hidden world of puzzles. A must-read for puzzle enthusiasts of all skill levels.--Cate Triola
Copyright 2022 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
March 15, 2022
The George Plimpton of thought experiments takes readers on a wide-ranging tour of puzzles, from crosswords to mazes and beyond. In his latest foray into lighthearted, experiential journalism, Jacobs opens with the thrilling discovery that he'd been used as a clue in a New York Times crossword puzzle--a thrill lessened somewhat by appearing in the hard-to-solve Saturday edition, "proof that I'm totally obscure, the very embodiment of irrelevance." Undeterred, the author, a puzzle addict whose interests embrace not just crosswords, but also "mazes, secret codes, riddles, logic puzzles," and other nerdy pursuits, embarked on a quest to find puzzle makers and solvers in dusty warrens, convention centers, and other venues. TheTimes, he discovered, was late in the game when it came to crosswords, having sniffed that they were "too lowbrow, too frivolous." Under the guidance of the learned but democratically minded Will Shortz, the paper has become the gold standard of crosswords. Throughout, Jacobs ventures theories on how the puzzles sharpen the brain, help us solve real-world problems, and "are an existential grasp at certainty and closure in an uncertain world." Sometimes they induce despair, as the author's early encounters with the Rubik's Cube reveal. He was hardly more cheered after an international jigsaw-puzzle competition in which he was bested by a "man from Uganda who later told me he is color-blind." Corn mazes, secret codes, chess gambits, the river-crossing problem, and the Tower of Hanoi: Jacobs is refreshingly captivated by every kind of mental challenge, it seems, and his enthusiasm serves this lively--and puzzle-stuffed--book well. The author even proves to be his own riddler, promising that there is a secret puzzle hidden in the book, the first solver of which will receive $10,000: "I figured I couldn't write a book on puzzles that didn't contain a secret one itself." A barrel of monkeys' worth of fun for the puzzle addict in the household.
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April 15, 2022
Jacobs explores the puzzling world of puzzles in this ridiculously entertaining book. Readers familiar with his previous books, including The Know-It-All (2004) and The Year of Living Biblically (2007), will know that this author tends to take a hands-on approach to his material. He doesn't just write about something--he lives it. Here, he evolves from a guy who is generally ambivalent about puzzles to a serious enthusiast. He enters competitions, gets to know some of the bigwigs of the puzzling world (it really is a fascinating subculture), and ruminates on some of life's bigger questions and how puzzles can sometimes point us toward the answers. He writes in a light, conversational style, as though he were sitting in our living rooms and telling us a story or two. He makes us think without making a big deal about it, telling us what puzzling came to mean to him and inviting us to join him in his voyage of discovery. The book is a lot of fun, but it's the serious stuff that gives it weight.
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