Books in Mensa® series

Every book in Trip Payne's popular, inexpensive crossword series has become a bestseller. Now, this genius of crossword creation (he had his first puzzles published when he was just in junior high and won the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament a grand three times) is back with a seventh collection. That should make puzzle-loving kids positively ecstatic. The age-appropriate clues include "Aladdin rubbed a magic one," "Famous ____ (brand of cookies)," and "You might use one in a treasure hunt." There's nothing in here that isn't worth knowing, nothing that's obscure or arcane. So, for youngsters it's lots of fun. Happy solving!

Puzzle master Trip Payne is back with more Mensa-quality crosswords for smart young word lovers. His brain-busting collections--including Awesome Crosswords for Kids and Clever Crosswords for Kids have all become bestsellers, and in these puzzles Payne's devoted audience will find the challenges it craves. Each crossword offers plenty of variety, with questions about sports, food, movies, geography, colloquial sayings—anything at all. And to make things even trickier, the same word might recur in different contexts from one puzzle to the next: Bat might be the answer to “flying animal" in one instance and to "baseball club" in another, so watch out! From "Homer Simpson's exclamation” to “The calm center of a hurricane,” these crossword clues offer plenty of intriguing enjoyment.

An Official Mensa Puzzle BookMaster crossword creator Trip Payne has devised ingenious kids’ puzzles for such publications as Scholastic News, Games Junior, and TV Guide. His Crosswords for Kids has sold nearly 60,000 copies, his other titles in the series are selling well, and now he’s back with another children’s challenge. These 40 puzzles, with such age-appropriate clues as “Insect that buzzes,” “Monsters, ___ (animated movie),” “Superman, for example,” and “Pointy building in Seattle: 2 words,” will keep youngsters entertained for hours. At the same time, these crosswords will help improve kids’ concentration and their vocabulary.

Give kids some smart fun! Crosswords are simply the perfect combination of entertainment and intellectual stimulation. They get children thinking: in fact, when youngsters follow the clues to find the correct answers they're actually solving mini-mysteries and using logic. One of the best puzzle-makers around presents delightfully brainteasing crosswords made just for kids; they're so good they've even earned Mensa's endorsement. Child-friendly clues include references to Harry Potter, Star Wars, and The Wizard of Oz, but also focus on popular sayings, geography, science, nature, comic strips, holidays, and more. It's brainy amusement children will love.

The author of Science Puzzles for Young Einsteins (40,000 sold) serves up another helping of puzzle fun for kids. And children will really enjoy these, because it doesn't take a huge vocabulary to complete a crisscross. Solvers just have to figure out how to fit all the words listed on the page into the correct space on the grid, based on length and crossing letters. (There are plenty of hints to guide newcomers, too.) Kids will love doing these puzzles with great subjects like "At the Beach," "Baseball Terms," "Birthday Party," "Halloween Costumes," "Music," and many more.

Champions at checkers, according to Sherlock Holmes creator Arthur Conan Doyle, learn everything needed to become great detectives. Become a winner! Learn to find alternative solutions to problems, break down complex situations, and keep control of your long-term strategy. Here's everything you need to know to leave your opponent gasping in surprise. Dozens of strategies take you, move by move, through many entire games. Start with the basic moves that put you on the winning track. See how to protect your pieces, get kings and use them well, and block your opponent. Fight for control of the center of the board, set up multiple jumps, and avoid the "dog hole." You even learn to play computer checkers, with move-by-move replays of great recent man-versus-machine contests, plus Internet sites where you can pit yourself against "Chinook," the world computer checkers champion. BIG BONUS: The back cover is a specially designed fold-out game board. Open it up, put down the pieces, and practice all the techniques and strategies as you go through the book. 128 pages, 78 b/w illus., 5 3/8 x 8 1/4.

Can you remember what Tweety-Bird likes to say, or identify The Three Stooges? Know the name of an island near Florida or the direction the sun rises? Test your word power with 40 super-fun crosswords from the folks at American Mensa. Each puzzle features all the things you love-your favorite books, movies and cartoons; the games you play; and lots more. And when you come across a clue that stumps you-don't worry! Just go on and do the others and soon you'll be able to fill in the blanks. There are names of planets and continents, lines from "Yankee Doodle Dandy," nursery rhyme words, plus the nickname for Texas, a red flower with thorns, and a singing chipmunk. It's smart entertainment!

Hone your skills and analytic powers with 101 brilliant checkerstrategies and come out ahead every time. Divided into beginning,middle, and endgame tactics, each puzzle showcases a different boardlayout, with a description of what's happening. Put yourself in theplayer's place to work out what each game-clinching move could be.There's a tip on every page, solutions, American Checker Federationrules, a glossary, and a special fold-out checker board!

After his bestselling Word Search Puzzles for Kids, Awesome Word Search Puzzles for Kids, and Clever Word Search Puzzles for Kids, Mark Danna's out to baffle youngsters again--and they'll enjoy every second of it. These puzzles are wildly imaginative and ingeniously designed. Instead of the usual grid, each one consists of a picture that fits the puzzle's subject, including an elephant and a dinosaur. There are other twists too. Three puzzles don't have a word list, so children have to create one from the clues. "Rappin' Up the Week" asks solvers to fill in the rhymes of a humorous rap song. Rebus puzzles feature little drawings. To top it off, every puzzle contains a hidden message that kids will uncover once they've completed the search.