ABSTRACT
Let’s pause for a moment and review our progress thus far. Many of the puzzle designs described in this book might be regarded as a systematic dissection of some geometric form into bits, usually identical, which are then partially recombined into puzzle pieces. The superfi cial perception of this strange pastime is that a second party can then enjoy the confusion of trying to reconstruct the original solid. In fact, there is often no clear dividing line as to where the design process stops and the solution begins, or who is the designer and who is the solver. They may be one and the same. In some of the plane dissection puzzles in Chapter 1, discovering the dissection is the real puzzler, after which the pattern solutions are relatively easy. In those like the Four-Piece Pyramid Puzzle, as presented, the design becomes the solution. In the Jupiter, the intriguing design overshadows the straightforward solution because it is by much the more interesting of the two. Some puzzles foisted upon the reader in previous chapters (if only one could write in a whisper) may not even have solutions! It is common practice in most puzzle books to include the solutions somewhere. Perhaps some readers will be disappointed to fi nd so many missing in this book. Solutions are fi ne when they serve some purpose. Certainly a book of riddles would be dull reading without the clever answers included, while answers to crossword puzzles may be educational. In the case of most combinatorial puzzles, including the solutions would add nothing new or interesting. There are exceptions, and note that some solutions have been included when appropriate. Here are four more of them:
1. Karl Essley’s two misplaced pieces in Chapter 1 were of course identical and triangular, but we will never know who got them, will we?
