Redlass's Full Review: Paul Sloane and Des MacHale - Challenging Lateral ...
A man and his sister were out shopping one day when the man said, "That boy over there is my nephew." "That is right," replied his sister, "but he is not my nephew." How come? (p. 12)
Want to stretch your brain?
Paul Sloane and Des MacHale have written a series of books filled with lateral thinking puzzles. The easy ones are like the ones listed above. (The pair are a normal brother and sister and the explanation is a simple one.)
Lateral thinking is the process of thinking through problems from a different direction. It involves setting aside assumptions and slowing down the thinking process. Too often, Sloane and MacHale tell us, we quickly jump to false conclusions when faced with a problem and end up making poor judgments.
The puzzles in this book are designed to be either read by yourself or with a group. In a group setting, they can become part of a game. One person is picked to read a puzzle. For example, he or she might pick one of the "fiendish" puzzles and read this to the other players:
A man and his wife were driving quickly from the suburbs into town when their car ran out of fuel. The man left his wife in the car after telling her to keep the windows closed and the doors locked. When he returned, although the doors and windows were still locked and had remained so throughout, he found his wife dead inside and a stranger in the car. The car had not been broken into or damaged in any way, and it had no sunroof or hatchback; the only means of entry were the doors. How had the wife died and who was the stranger? (p. 36)
The players can then ask questions. Under the most traditional rules of the game, the person proposing the puzzle can answer only yes/no/irrelevant. This book bends those rules and provides some sample questions with more elaborate answers. In the example above, they provide the following sample questions and answers:
Q: Was there something special or unusual about the car?
A: No. It was a regular four-door family car.
Q: Was the stranger a human being? Which sex?
A: Yes. Male.
Q: Was the woman's death murder or suicide?
A: No. It was accidental.
Q: Did she die of poisoning, suffocation, or heart attack?
A: No.
Q: Was the stranger the cause of the woman's death?
A: Yes, although not deliberately.
As the person reading the puzzle also knows the answer, he or she must be prepared for other questions. Sloane and MacHale point out in the introduction that those who are most successful at this game are those who are "imaginative and logical, who test all assumptions and then try to narrow down the area of search with broad questions before honing in on specific details."
Sloane and MacHale have organized this book so that it can be just as fun for the individual as it is as a party game. The first section are the puzzles, broken up into easy, moderate, difficult, and fiendish. The second section provides all the clues and the final section the answers. This lets a person think through the problem and the clues before reading the solution.
They have also thrown in two "WALLY Tests." WALLY tests are filled with trick questions. You have four minutes to answer 15 questions and are not supposed to change any answer once you put it down. Some of these questions are pretty well-known (How many animals did Moses take into the Ark?) while others are more challenging (If Mr. Jones' peacock laid an egg in Mr. Brown's garden, who is the rightful owner of the egg?).
It does become obvious that this is one book in a series--and a later one in the series at that. Some of the puzzles really stretch for an answer and are difficult to figure out unless you have either specialized knowledge or have heard the problem before. The authors claim that the frustration is part of the fun. I'm not sure they've convinced me, though the wealth of trivial knowledge is certainly entertaining.
For example: Why was the man painting his portrait on an eggshell? The clues are that he is not a serious painter, but had a very good reason for painting his likeness on an eggshell. We're also told that his profession matters and that the portrait really does look like him when he is working.
I was still pretty flummoxed about the answer to that one and I doubt any amount of questioning would have helped me to figure it out. For someone who shared this man's profession, the answer might have been very plain. (I'll give you another hint: He's a type of entertainer.)
While the puzzles in this book were designed to either do alone or in a group, it is also possible to use them online, though it gets a little trickier. When the games forum was opened up on EpinionAddicts (www.eaforums.com for anyone who is interested), we did several similar puzzles online. While they don't work as well online as in a room full of people, this book and others like it certainly provide lots of material to work with.
I picked up this book and the rest of the series several years ago. The first book in the series (written by only Paul Sloane) is Lateral Thinking Puzzles. I found that book far superior to this one as the questions are more general knowledge, rely on questioning one's assumptions, and thinking logically. There was also a much longer introduction to what lateral thinking is and how one can improve the skill through practice.
However, this book is still amusing and is a useful book to pull out when I need to stretch creative muscles or break out of cliched thinking to solve a problem. If you enjoy logic puzzles, this book would also be worth your investment and can often be found at bargain book stores.
P.S. I will put the answers to the puzzles in this review in the comment section so as not to be a spoiler to anyone who wants to try to figure them out.
Lateral thinking is the key to solving these tantalizing puzzles. Packed with hundreds of brain teasers and mathematical problems, the book will test ...More at Alibris
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