The Master Theorem - A Book of Puzzles, Intrigue and Wit

I was accidentally sent a used book, but the seller was prompt with responding to my inquiry about it and had great customer service with rectifying the situation!The book itself has been enjoyable with a variety of puzzles of varying difficulties. I haven’t finished the book yet, but of the ones I’ve done so far, some were pretty easy and some left me stumped for a while. All in all, I’m happy with my purchase.

If you care enough to read the reviews on a puzzle book then this book is for you. Very eclectic collection of puzzles that will make you have to reach into every part of your mind to figure them all out. It comes with coded progressive hints that can nudge you in the right direction without coming close to giving you the solution if you get stuck. The book is packed with full color puzzle pages that makes the price tag fully worth it. Each puzzle starts with a story or description that usually has some hints at where you should start on the puzzle. Using google is recommended and actually required now and then unless you are an encyclopedia. It's funny, exciting, and might even teach you a few things. You won't regret getting it.

I remember when I stumbled upon The Master Theorem site in 2011. I was late to the game, but TMT reminded me of the early days of the internet - when there was always something lurking & exciting (& *SECRET*).The Master Theorem or TMT was a *SECRET SOCIETY* of Solvers, with someone named M at the helm who claimed to be a Columbia University smartypants that helped the FBI solve crimes. M was alluring, smart & snarky - it was likely the intrigue of M that brought most of us back week after week, not *just* the puzzles. New theorems were released Midnight on Thursdays & I would stay up eagerly every Wednesday to try my best to solve quickly.On the website the puzzles would range from a Rebus style Picture Puzzle to more (annoyingly difficult) Riddles to interactive graphs, scavenger hunts, etc. Sometimes the theorems would be so simple I would assume it was a trick. Other times they were so maddening I would feel like tossing my computer out the window.I even was asked to be a "tester" for the Theorems - which was a shock to me because I was never at a top ranking. I was in the low 600s of the Solver Ranking list, but how exciting to be a part of a truly unique part of Internet Puzzling / Sleuthing!Needless to say, I was very sad when TMT came to an end. Until this book came out! I have quickly been reminded of how fun the Theorem Life is & how humbling.If you think you need to be a MENSA smarty pants for this, allow me to assuage that fear for you: I am not MENSA level solver, I went to Art School. If I get stumped, I use the clues in the back (as I did on the site) albeit sparingly, in hopes they will give my brain a little nudge to think of things in a different light. If you enjoy crosswords & wordplay, rebus puzzles, trivia, etc this is the book for you!

Okay so for me the most perplexing thing about this book is actually not necessarily the puzzles but the choice to have the hints encoded with a Caesar cipher, And yet if you flip a few more pages the very blatant solutions are laid out with no encryption or seal. I feel like the last section of the book that has the solutions should have been sealed behind some kind of wrapper that you had to break open. As it is right now you might accidentally flip to them even if you don't want to! I ended up putting a rubber band around the last section so I didn't inadvertently spoil the puzzles.Aside from that odd choice the book is good and the puzzles are challenging for sure. It's kind of expensive for a paperback though, and like I said I wish the solutions had been sealed somehow and I also wish the hints were just in plain text.

Love this so far!! I’ve only done the training puzzles and maybe the first five puzzles but I’m digging it. I’m a hardcore escape room enthusiast, so I love puzzles, even though I’mnot very good at them. A lot of enthusiasts love Journal 29. Blech! That thing was impossible for me. Even when I had the actual answer, half the time I couldn’t see how anyone would get that answer or where.These puzzles on the other hand, are great! They make you think! I had to come back to one the next day because I was racking my brain. With the narrative that points you in the right direction, it’s logical and fun. Not so obscure, but hard enough to be a challenge.I recommend this to puzzle lovers everywhere. Can’t wait to solve some more!!

Super fun to do these with my 10 year old daughter! She caught on to the " code" super quick

Every brain needs this book!

I got this book for my mom. She is a former computer programmer, loves puzzles and I had no idea what to get her for Christmas. I was worried the puzzles would be super easy and she would just fly through it, but some of the puzzles were really challenging! You can do them alone or work as a group. For reference, we had a 65 year old, 44 year old and 20 year old doing the puzzles together and everyone loved the book!

My smarter half enjoys all kind of brain-ticklers - puzzles, adventure rooms, math problems, mysteries. This book is the Champaign of all puzzle books. Most of the puzzles in this book are not easy, some require some knowledge one needs to Google (for instance we are both math majors but we still needed to google a certain - relatively well known to crypto-nerds - cypher for one of the puzzles). However everything makes sense in the end. Some puzzles can be solved in less than half an hour, others, well, you ponder about them over a few days. The hints make sense and give you just enough to give you a light nudge. If you like clever puzzles, this book is for you.

The book is good but don't buy it from Amazon. They sent me a second hand one that already had the solutions filled in by a previous owner. It was advertised as nee and charged full price

First of all, this "M" is obnoxiously conceited, so prepare to read page after page of this dude waffle on about how great he is and everything he's accomplished. Unfortunately you *have* to read this stuff, because in between all of the bragging, he drops puzzle hints.I was disappointed by the puzzles as well, given this book's rave reviews and price. For me, I either understood what to do pretty quickly (within 5 minutes), or not at all. I found the hints pretty useless, as about half the puzzles require just way to much mind-reading to figure out how to solve them. I solved some of the "hard" puzzles with relative ease, and was completely stumped by some of the supposedly "easy" ones.Some of the code-breaking puzzles were pretty interesting and satisfying to solve, but overall this was just too uneven of a puzzle-solving experience for me to be able to recommend it. If you're looking for a more enjoyable (and more affordable) puzzling experience, try the Montague Island series by Schmittberger.