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HomeEverything ElseCryptic Kakuro and Cross Sums Sudoku |
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| Customer Reviews: | | Average Customer Review: ( 1 customer reviews )
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2 of 2 found the following review helpful:
Multiple solutions and poorly edited instructions Oct 01, 2008
By TCR puzzler
My Background with Puzzles
I am a long-time solver of cross sums (my favorite puzzles for years, now known as kakuro) and sudoku, as well as other math and logic problems. For the past 10 + years, I have chosen my Dell and Penny Press puzzle books by the number of cross sums they have, though I have been working a variety of math/logic puzzles for about 20 years. I seldom need hints or help to solve even the challenger kakuro and sudoku.
Multiple Solutions
That said, I began solving the puzzles in this book and found that I came up with upwards of 10 workable solutions for some puzzles. I'm a number of pages into the book now (working my way through the level 4 puzzles), and I find that more puzzles have multiple solutions than have single solutions. At first, I completed the easiest puzzles and paused, saying, "surely I made a mistake; there shouldn't be more than one solution." So I checked my logic and math a couple of times and found I hadn't made any mistakes; each solution worked. I moved on and found the same thing happening in puzzle after puzzle.
This book is frustrating because I've come to expect a single solution from most kakuro and sudoku puzzles. Yes, I keep working the puzzles because that's who I am! I finish a puzzle, count the number of solutions, write that in the margin to show that I'm finished with it rather still working on it, and then move to the next one. Perhaps because I don't want to feel that I wasted my money.
If you don't mind having many viable solutions, this won't be a problem for you. I mind, though.
Editing
Also, the wording in the introduction is awkward, and it is poorly edited. The publisher should have copy edited the intro and reworded it to make the solving instructions clear. The intro seems to be written more for mathematicians (with info about the theory) rather than for solvers. That didn't stop me from figuring out how to work the puzzles, but it is unnecessary material for the average person who is going to buy a puzzle book; it gets in the way of trying to learn how to work the puzzles. Perhaps that material could be consolidated in its own sub-section if the author chooses to publish another volume.
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