When I was looking for some books at a bookstore for my nephew, when I came across this latest work of Jon Scieszka and Lane Smith. Children will know what they’re in for when they read it: “If the sum of my nieces and nephews equals 15, and their product equals 54, and I have more nephews than nieces, HOW MANY NEPHEWS AND HOW MANY NIECES IS THIS BOOK DEDICATED TO?” The story revolves around a girl who wakes up to discover that everything was arranging itself into a math problem. Throughout the day, each event inspires her to create new sets of problems, which quickly develop from the merely arithmetical to the moderately puzzling to the truly wacky. Bold in design and often bizarre in expression, it clearly expresses the child’s bemusement, frustration, panic and her eventual joy when she overcomes the curse. The book will definitely cure many children of math phobia.

PUZZLE 1: There are three Federation Officers assigned to take three hostile aliens to “Peace Talks” on another planet. However, they must follow the following rules:

They have only one small space ship. Only two individuals can ride in the space ship each time. All Federation Officers can pilot the space ship, but only one alien can pilot the ship. If at any time there are both Federation Officers and aliens on a planet, then there must always be more (or the same number of) Federation Officers than aliens on that planet. This is because if there are more aliens than Federation Officers, then the aliens will kill the Federation Officers. Count any individual in the space ship when it is on one planet as being on that planet. The one space ship is the only means of transportation. There is no other way to get to the “Peace Talks”. No one can exit the space ship while it is in flight. To start off, all the Federation Officers and aliens are on the same planet. The Question: Can all Federation Officers and aliens get to the other planet alive, and if so: how?

Solutions on May 15

CORRECT ENTRIES

April 17

Subrata Chatterjee; Rohit Gupta, Burnpur; Sreeja Dutta; Kuntlesh Dewangan, Ranchi; Arnab Thokder, Calcutta; Shyam Kumar Ray, Jadavpur; Sudipto Banerjee, Minneapolis; Sneha Soni, Howrah; Subham Soni Howrah; Sourya Pal, Cal- 8; Sulakshan Ghosh, Kharagpur; Harjesh Bawa, Cal- 1; K.N.Ajit Narayan, Cal-8, Snehal Doshi, Cal- 26; Mahima Chaudhuri, Cal- 61; S Krishnaiyer, Cal- 61; Snehansu Shekhar Samanta, Cal- 14; Anthony Alangara Michael, Dimapur; Diptarang Mukherjee; Aryabhatta Gorain, Cal- 9; Sreeja Dutta; Soumava Chakraborty, Ravi Raja.

Please send your entries to knowhow@abpmail.com within 10 days. For snail mail the address is Brainstorming KnowHow, 6, Prafulla Sarkar Street, Calcutta- 700 001. Send complete entries, not one line entries.

PUZZLE CRACKED

Solution: Valiant Jack; Long Lost City; Hypothermia. Adventuresome Sam; Rain Forest; Eaten by Crocodile. Daring Derek; Frozen Wasteland; Viral Illness. Fearless Dan; Swampy Creek; High Fall. Courageous Fred; Dirty Desert; Food Poisoning. Brave Barry; Sailing the Oceans; Starvation.

Hint: Suppose the one who died of hypothermia travelled for six months, and the one who went to the Dirty Desert travelled for twelve months. Which is impossible. The one who went sailing the Oceans travelled for 12 months. Thereby implying that the one who died of hypothermia travelled for one month and the one who went to the Dirty Desert travelled for seven months. Fitting in these possible combination and eliminating the others we can get the solution.