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A review by cocoonofbooks
The Mysterious Benedict Society: Mr. Benedict's Book of Perplexing Puzzles, Elusive Enigmas, and Curious Conundrums by Trenton Lee Stewart, Diana Sudyka
3.0
This was pretty hit-or-miss. I think it would be best enjoyed immediately after finishing [b:The Mysterious Benedict Society Collection|8242755|The Mysterious Benedict Society Collection (The Mysterious Benedict Society, #1-3)|Trenton Lee Stewart|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1441936938s/8242755.jpg|13090271] when you're looking for a little more time with the series' characters and would enjoy the character profiles and quoted passages from the books. There was a broad range in difficulty level, from incredibly easy to incredibly challenging. Some had straightforward directions, but for quite a few of them I had no idea what I was even being asked to do, and had to look up the "Hints" section to even figure out what the puzzle was, then had no way of knowing if I'd solved it correctly.
Throughout the book there are red circles around various letters and numbers, which fill in a final puzzle in the back of the book. I wish that every puzzle throughout the book had had a red circle on one of the characters in the solution, but some of them circled letters in the instructions instead, so it made those solutions feel less important. Plus, since those solutions didn't carry forward to anything, and there wasn't an Answers section, there was no way of confirming that the answer was correct, which I personally found frustrating.
Again, I think this would be best experienced as an immediate follow-up to the original series, when you might have the most patience for ambiguous puzzles to solve like those the characters encountered. Picking this up independently long after finishing the series, I expected more straightforward puzzles — here's what you need to do, here's what you're trying to find — and that's probably the main source of my disappointment.
Throughout the book there are red circles around various letters and numbers, which fill in a final puzzle in the back of the book. I wish that every puzzle throughout the book had had a red circle on one of the characters in the solution, but some of them circled letters in the instructions instead, so it made those solutions feel less important. Plus, since those solutions didn't carry forward to anything, and there wasn't an Answers section, there was no way of confirming that the answer was correct, which I personally found frustrating.
Again, I think this would be best experienced as an immediate follow-up to the original series, when you might have the most patience for ambiguous puzzles to solve like those the characters encountered. Picking this up independently long after finishing the series, I expected more straightforward puzzles — here's what you need to do, here's what you're trying to find — and that's probably the main source of my disappointment.