The Gchq Puzzle

** WINNER OF 'STOCKING FILLER OF THE YEAR AWARD' GUARDIAN ** Pit your wits against the people who cracked Enigma in the official puzzle book from Britain's secretive intelligence organisation, GCHQ. 'A fiendish work, as frustrating, divisive and annoying as it is deeply fulfilling: the true spirit of Christmas' Guardian 'Surely the trickiest puzzle book in years. Crack these fiendish problems and Trivial Pursuit should be a doddle' Daily Telegraph If 3=T, 4=S, 5=P, 6=H, 7=H ...what is 8? What is the next letter in the sequence: M, V, E, M, J, S, U, ? Which of the following words is the odd one out: CHAT, COMMENT, ELF, MANGER, PAIN, POUR? GCHQ is a top-secret intelligence and security agency which recruits some of the very brightest minds. Over the years, their codebreakers have helped keep our country safe, from the Bletchley Park breakthroughs of WWII to the modern-day threat of cyberattack. So it comes as no surprise that, even in their time off, the staff at GCHQ love a good puzzle. Whether they're recruiting new staff or challenging each other to the toughest Christmas quizzes and treasure hunts imaginable, puzzles are at the heart of what GCHQ does. Now they're opening up their archives of decades' worth of codes, puzzles and challenges for everyone to try. In this book you will find: - Tips on how to get into the mindset of a codebreaker - Puzzles ranging in difficulty from easy to brain-bending - A competition section where we search for Britain's smartest puzzler Good luck! 'Ideal for the crossword enthusiast' Daily Telegraph

*Featuring an introduction from Their Royal Highnesses, the Prince and Princess of Wales!* Can you think like a spy? Then we have a top secret challenge for YOU . . . For over one hundred years, GCHQ (or the Government Communications Headquarters) have worked in secret to gather information and solve the toughest of problems to help keep the people of the UK safe and secure. We are analysts, linguists, engineers, mathematicians, programmers, codebreakers, and lots more - all working together in brilliant teams to solve seemingly impossible problems. At GCHQ, we solve puzzles every day . . . and we're giving you a rare glimpse into our world, by setting you a top secret mission: solve problems and break codes that could befuddle the cleverest codebreaker. From codes and brainteasers to word riddles to language puzzles, there is something for everyone. So grab your friends and family and see how bringing together a mix of minds can solve anything.

WOULD BLETCHLEY PARK--THE TOP-SECRET HOME OF BRITISH WORLD WAR II CODEBREAKERS--HAVE RECRUITED YOU? PUT YOUR MENTAL AGILITY TO THE TEST WITH THESE FIENDISHLY CHALLENGING PUZZLES AND FIND OUT. Have a knack for mastering Morse code? Want to discover whether your crossword hobby might have seen you recruited into the history books? Think you could have contributed to the effort to crack the Nazis' infamous Enigma code? Then this book about Bletchley Park was custom-made for you. When scouring the population for codebreakers, Bletchley Park recruiters left no stone unturned. They devised various ingenious mind-twisters to assess the puzzle-solving capacity of these individuals--hidden codes, cryptic crosswords, secret languages, and complex riddles. These puzzles, together with the fascinating recruitment stories that surround them, are contained in this book, endorsed by Bletchley Park itself. Though they had diverse backgrounds, the codebreakers of Bletchley Park were united in their love of a good puzzle. If you are of the same persuasion, put your intelligence to the test with the mind-boggling puzzles on these pages and ask yourself: Would Bletchley Park have recruited YOU?

The Ministry of Quizzes is the must-buy gift book for quiz solvers and puzzlers, from David Gentle, author of On the Tip of My Tongue. Perfect for fans of the GCHQ Puzzle Book, Bletchley Park Brainteasers, and The Ordnance Survey Puzzle Book. Deep in the heart of Whitehall, up a quiet side road, is an office block. Unremarkable on the outside, inside it buzzes and bustles with activity. Civil servants are hard at work, researching, compiling, cross-checking. Facts and trivia, questions and puzzles. This is the Ministry of Quizzes. This small but essential government department serves the nation’s needs on all matters relating to quizzes, puzzles and general knowledge trivia. Now, for the first time, their work can be revealed. The Ministry of Quizzes features an ingenious and irresistible mixture of over 200 quizzes and puzzles to be played solo or with family and friends. Not everyone is convinced this government department actually exists. But how else could we explain such a copious and comprehensive collection of diverse, devious and distracting questions and brainteasers? 'I find it impossible to believe you will not love this book' - Daniel Radcliffe

THE ULTIMATE GIFT FOR WANNABE SPIES: AN INTERACTIVE PUZZLE BOOK FROM THE CREATOR OF THE BESTSELLING CULT PHENOMENON, JOURNAL 29! In this brain-bending interactive game, you'll solve puzzles on every page, and obtain keys to move forward by submitting answers online. To solve each puzzle, you'll need to think outside the book. You are an agent of CY.P.H.E.R., the secret international agency working on 'unsolvable' code-based cases. Called upon to investigate cryptic clues discovered in the wake of a series of mysterious disappearances, the clock is ticking to crack the codes before it's too late. To escape this book, you must write, draw, search, fold and cut pages, explore virtual escape rooms and think laterally to identify the perpetrator and solve the mystery. All you need to play is a pencil, a pair of scissors, an internet connection, and a curious mind.

Pit your wits against the brilliant minds of Scotland Yard and see if you have what it takes to solve dozens of the world's toughest crimes. "Scotland Yard" conjures up so much more than just London's Metropolitan Police. Since it opened its doors in 1829, Scotland Yard has been synonymous the world over with the highest level of detective work and famous for its ability to solve the most macabre of murders and catch the most audacious of thieves. The Scotland Yard Puzzle Book mines the history of this famous institution to recreate some of the most complex conundrums its detectives have ever faced. Armchair detectives can now try their hand and keen powers of observation and deduction to solve for themselves dozens of the most difficult and challenging cases. Activities include: Anagrams and cryptograms Logic, linguistic, and mathematical puzzles Map puzzles Coded and visual puzzles Brainteasers Hidden messages And more (answers are provided in the back of the book)!

My mind rebels at stagnation. Give me problems, give me work, give me the most abstruse cryptogram or the most intricate analysis, and I am in my own proper atmosphere. -Sherlock Holmes, The Sign of the Four. Pit your wits against the greatest detective of them all with this collection of over 130 fiendish and hugely entertaining puzzles and enigmas.Some involve riddles, some plays on words, and some rely on mathematical principles. Use your powers of logical deduction, and see if you can match the towering intellect of Sherlock Holmes. Not only does this collection include brilliant puzzles to ponder over, but it presents these quandaries within exchanges between Holmes and Watson. In this way, this puzzle book retains the same cosy Victorian charm that Holmes' tales are so loved for. Featuring the original pen and ink illustrations by Sidney Paget and George Hutchinson, this gorgeously designed puzzle book will immerse you in Holmes's mysteries and keep you entertained for hours!

*** With a foreword by Alexander Armstrong. Do you know your Chopin from your Schubert? Your concerto from your cadenza? The Classic FM Puzzle Book 365 will test your musical knowledge to the very core, with a fiendishly difficult puzzle to challenge you every single day of the year. From quizzes to wordsearches, logic tests to missing symbols - via emojis, sudoku, crosswords and more - our classical music experts have created a compendium of puzzles to keep you guessing the whole year round.