New York Times crossword puzzle editor Will Shortz plans to donate his collection of more than 20,000 puzzle books and magazines to Indiana University.

Shortz told the Indianapolis Star that he discussed the bequest with Indiana University library officials last spring, when he was in Bloomington to give the school’s commencement address. Will Shortz collection includes the first American crossword puzzle, printed in the now-defunct New York World in 1913. His oldest book is from 1543.

Will Shortz graduated from Indiana University in 1974, using the school’s Individualized Major Program to earn a degree in what he calls “enigmatology”, or the [Read More...]

Animal Puzzles for the Scroll Saw: 30 Projects in Wood is a book with 80 pages written by Judy Peterson and Dave Peterson and available from Amazon.

Unlike conventional flat puzzles, this guide presents 30 interlocking patterns that stand erect and can be displayed vertically. Designed for scroll sawyers of all skill levels, this easy-to-follow guide includes patterns for numerous mammals, reptiles, birds, and household pets.

Instructions on getting started and selecting the proper tools, woods, and blades accompany detailed information on how to design an animal puzzle from [Read More...]

The talented Grabarchuk family have produced a tantalizing collection of highly original puzzles, each with its own set of rules (or rules you have to find yourself). Often geometrical in character, these puzzles are always entertaining and sometimes fiendishly difficult.

This collection of more than one hundred original and highly sophisticated puzzles presents challenges that require creative, outside of the box thinking. Many different types of puzzles are included, such as word, number, logical, visual, spatial, dissection, dividing, dot-connecting, matchstick, coin, and more. Each aesthetically appealing puzzle is designed to improve problem solving skills; train geometric, combinatorial, and spatial imagination; [Read More...]

BigFlyGames has published their first puzzle book called ‘PrismaPixels; Colored Pixel Puzzles’.

This picture logic puzzle book is the first of its kind, a pixel puzzle book in full color. There are many black and white pixel puzzle books out that have been gaining in popularity over the past ten years. They appear under such names as Picture Logic Puzzles, O’ekaki, Paint By Numbers, and simply Pixel Puzzles.

You can also find colored pixel puzzles online, but up until now, not in book form. ‘PrismaPixels; Colored Pixel Puzzles’ contains eighty pages with over fifty logic puzzles ranging from [Read More...]

KenKen is the brilliant successor to Sudoku that’s taken Japan by storm selling over one million copies in less than a year.

In collaboration with The Times, Collins – the no 1 puzzle publisher – are proud to be bringing it to the UK. KenKen is a new type of brain-training puzzle based on logic and simple arithmetic. Perfect for all ages and highly addictive, KenKen puzzles challenge and entertain in an entirely new way! The puzzle was invented by a charismatic Japanese maths teacher, Tetsuya Miyamoto in 2004.

The name comes from ‘Ken’ which is the Japanese word for [Read More...]

A few years ago I made some wooden puzzles myself, not very successful but the puzzle worked. This weekend I received two books from Amazon I ordered about crafting wooden puzzles yourself:

Crafting Wood Logic Puzzles – Very nice book with 126 pages explaining into detail how to make 18 different kind of three dimensional games for the hands and mind. For each puzzle there are lost of pictures showing how every step of crafting wooden puzzles is explained including a cutting list and the tools and material needed to make one [Read More...]

Slitherlink & Sudoku is a new puzzle book by Nikoli which is available from Amazon.com.

Slitherink are engaging logic puzzles with some simple rules and four numbers: 0, 1, 2, and 3. They are Nikoli’s original creations and as, known as Sli-Lin in Japan, and they provide endless enjoyment. Nikoli is famous for their puzzle books as all puzzles are hand made without using a computer.

The grid features scattered dots and numbers; connect the dots with a vertical or horizontal line until you’ve created a single loop with no crossings or branches. The trick is [Read More...]