Tricky Lateral Thinking Puzzles

by Paul Sloane, Des MacHale, Myron Miller (Illustrations)

"A man writes the same number, and nothing else, on 20 sheets of paper. Why?" "A man went around the world in a ship. Yet he was always in sight of land. How come?" These are examples of lateral thinking puzzles. You're given a statement about a situation that you have to use as a starting point to arrive at a particular explanation or solution. Often there can be many possible scenarios to explain the puzzle, but the challenge is that you have to find the "right" answer. Typically the puzzles contain insufficient information for you to immediately figure out the solution (clues are provided). When you get stuck, attack the problem from a new direction--think laterally! Not only are these puzzles fun, they also help to develop skills in questioning, deduction, logic, and, of course, lateral thinking. It's January and he is writing the date of the year on all the checks in his checkbook to avoid putting last year's date by mistake; He was an astronaut in a space ship. 96 pages, 25 b/w illus., 5 3/8 x 8 1/4.

95 pages, Paperback

First published December 31, 1999

About the author

Paul Sloane read Engineering at Trinity Hall Cambridge. He came top of Sales School at IBM, became MD of Ashton-Tate UK, VP International for MathSoft and CEO of Monactive. He now writes, speaks and gives workshops on lateral thinking in business, creativity, innovation and leadership. He is married and lives in Camberley in Surrey. He has three grown-up daughters. He is a keen chess and tennis player and he plays keyboards in a rock band, the Fat Cats. He has written a series of lateral thinking puzzle books, many co-authored with Des MacHale, published by Sterling Publishing. They have sold over 2 million copies and been translated into many languages. He has also written two management books, published by Kogan Page, and many articles for blogs and websites. He manages the Lateral Puzzles Forum where puzzlers can set and solve lateral puzzles.

Reviews

[Penelope Payne · Rating 3 out of 5]

I loved some puzzles but others I found ridiculous - or there wasn't enough information given in the clues to get to the answer they wanted me to arrive at. Some puzzles were five stars and others were one star. Overall, I liked the book and had fun reading it.