Will Shortz Presents Ferocious KenKen: 200 Challenging Logic Puzzles That Make You Smarter

My husband and I are Kakuro addicts - we buy our puzzle books in pairs so we can "race" as we do each puzzle. Unfortunately, a high percentage of what's out there is just not challenging enough for us, and we've worked our way through all the challenging ones we can find. So I thought this might be an acceptable alternative, and bought a couple of copies. I'm pleased to report we've enjoyed the challenge of wrapping our mind around new type of arithmetic number logic. The puzzles are smaller and simpler than our favorite kakuro puzzles, but the puzzles are more complex because they include operations other than addition, so it's stretching some different brain-muscles. They start fairly simple (6x6 grids) but increase in size in difficulty later in the book.

Very hard, but very addicting, and very fun if you like Ken Ken puzzles. I remember when I first started these and was freaked out by the 9x9 puzzles. Now, all I want to do are the 9x9 puzzles. This book doesn't have enough of them; wish they were all 9x9!

First off let me say that as a math professor, having students, especially young ones (maybe 2nd or 3rd grade) do kenken would be the best way to teach them "number sense". That is what motivated the invented of Kenken.About this book specifically, all the puzzles are a good challenge for me. They are definitely not for beginners and make sure you have a good eraser to work them with. They take me awhile, but they are doable for the experienced but not crazy ken ken puzzler.

So far I've solved #s 1, 5, and 7. I consider myself advance. I can do 9X9 and I try not to use hints when solving, even with 9s, and depending on the puzzle I can keep the numbers straight without hints. I've been playing KenKen for about two years now. This book is going to last a while. Just know going in that it's going to be HARD. They meant the Ferocious part. This is going to be challenging even for advanced players.

I do these puzzles online and I like to have a book of them to help pass the time when I'm on airplanes. This book is particularly good because there are no easy puzzles in it.

All of the puzzles are the same, with plus, minus, times and division in each puzzle. We prefer a puzzles without all four functions, so none of them are what we like best. Also, the newsprint pages don't allow the erasures necessary to reorganize lines and columns as one goes along, as well as slicker paper would. Because we haven't completed our older, preferred book, this one is still unused. Being a Will Shortz presentation, however, I'm sure we'll enjoy them when we get over our disappointment.

If I don't think these puzzles are 'ferocious', they're not ferocious !!! There are some good ones, but a lot of easy ones as well. I'd rate the difficulty level as easy-to-medium. However, I have only completed a few, and I've noticed they have become more challenging as you get further into them.But I was expecting 200 'hard' puzzles, and I would certainly argue against that being the case.

This is a great book to have for those times when you have a few idle minutes waiting for something or somebody. There are enough pages to keep one busy for quite awhile. The grids are large enough to use comfortably. Love it.

Oh-oh these look very tough, I thought after the first few. But then they seemed to get easier again, and I went back and found the trick to do the ones I had missed. This is the first time I'd tried a 9x9 - luckily he doesn't quite throw you into the deep end as you progress to the larger grids. I do wish though that the solution included a few lines on HOW to solve it, though, to date, there are none that I've been unable to solve. Be warned there aren't that many 6x6's (the smallest size), if that's what you're used to. But still, recommended.

For those used to doing KenKen, these puzzles aren't what we would describe as ferocious. We had not previously done the 7x7, 8x8 or 9x9 puzzles, and found them to be no harder than the 6x6. Overall we were a bit disappointed with the difficulty level, but at least it kept us occupied on our holidays.

We used to fight to get hold of the KenKen in the Times each weekend. Now we have plenty to share between everyone - adults and teenagers.The puzzles start off with easy 6X6 then become more difficult, then easy 7x7 gradually becoming harder, then 8x8. We are now working on the 9x9.A great distraction from other things we should be doing.

Like other reviewers I was looking for something harder than The Times Ken Ken series and this lived up to expectation. Don't be fooled by the first section which is quite easy, there are definitely some tricky ones later as the grids get larger. As another reviewer said, it pays to take your time as there are sometimes several combinations that make up an answer, and if you go wrong (as I did several times) you get stuck and have to resort to peeking at the solution section! Alternatively tippex everything out and start again.I particularly like the use of all 4 arithmetical signs in the puzzles, rather than just + and -.The main problem for those who have worked through this book is what next? I do other puzzles such as sudoku and kakuro but like Ken Ken best. Come on Will Shortz - please give us more!

I got this as a gift for someone, and they say how much they enjoy the challenge! Great book to buy!