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https://github.com/donkirkby/book-blender

Solve a puzzle, read a book
https://github.com/donkirkby/book-blender

literature puzzle short-stories word-game

Last synced: 6 months ago
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Solve a puzzle, read a book

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README 

          
# Book Blender

## Solve a puzzle, read a book

Each puzzle is made from a short story that you can read as you solve it.

Download the puzzle's PDF and print it out.



New blended books are announced in the [blog] and its RSS feed, and usually on

[mastodon].



### Sorted Words Puzzle

There are two types of blended books for you to solve. The easiest is the sorted

words puzzle, where you have to unsort the letters in each word to read the

story. See the example below, then print and solve one of these:



* [The Fox and the Grapes], by Aesop - The classic fable of unfulfilled desire.

  (130 words)

* [Christmas Presents, 1914], from Punch Magazine - a humorous look at some less

  serious impacts of World War I on British families. This is from the same

  period when A. A. Milne was writing for Punch, but I don't know who wrote

  this. (630 words)

* [The Five Boons of Life], by Mark Twain - a rueful look at what drives us.

  (770 words)

* [The Failure of Hope & Wandel], by Ambrose Bierce - An ambitious business plan

  goes bust. This probably didn't win him any fans in the south. (810 words)

* [The Talking-Out of Tarrington], by Saki - Clovis avoids making a new friend.

  (980 words)

* [The Eyes Have It], by Philip K. Dick - Have we already made first contact?

  A lighter offering from the author of Minority Report and Blade Runner. (1,100

  words)

* [The Beggars], by Lord Dunsany - A story about joy, from one of the early

  masters of fantasy. (1,100 words)

* [The Feast of Nemesis], by Saki - How to counteract the peace and goodwill of

  the holidays. (1,500 words)

* [Luck], by Mark Twain - How a military "genius" made a name for himself.

  (1,700 words)

* [The Funny Young Gentleman], by Charles Dickens - a Victorian gentleman plays

  the fool to entertain his friends. Some of them even appreciate it. (1,300 words)

* [Nyarlathotep], by H. P. Lovecraft - An ancient god returns for the end of the

  world. Solve some of the easier stories before this one, or the challenging

  vocabulary will fill you with aeehinnopprs. (1,100 words)

* [Beyond Lies the Wub], by Philip K. Dick - why we should be cautious with

  alien first contact. (2,600 words)



### Shuffled Pages Puzzle

A more challenging puzzle is the shuffled pages puzzle. It was inspired by

[Cain's Jawbone], but intended to be solvable in a few minutes instead of a few

months. Print out one of these PDFs, and cut each page in four. Then read the

pages to figure out which order they go in to make a sensible story. The page

numbers are no longer numbers, but they might at least help you check your final

answer.



* [The Advocate's Wedding-Day], by Catherine Crowe - a guilty conscience ruins

  success. (29 pages)

* [The Mass of Shadows], by Anatole France - a creepy church story. (12 pages)

* [The Owl's Ear], by Erckmann-Chatrian - a mountainous mystery. (21 pages)

* [The Shadows on the Wall], by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman - a ghost story that's

  only slightly creepy. (23 pages)

* [The Signal-Man], by Charles Dickens - a mysterious vision haunts a railway

  worker. (26 pages)



If you get stuck, you can check the [shuffled pages solutions].



### Sorted Words Example

Here's the first section of The Fox and The Grapes, by Aesop:



[![fox-start]][fox-start]



Start unscrambling the letters in each word that you can. Some of the longer

words might be hard to unscramble, so skip them at first. Some words could be

unscrambled more than one way, like "was" or "saw", so skip them too.



[![fox-easy]][fox-easy]



Once you've unscrambled the easy words in a section, look below the * * *

divider. Each column shows all the letters at that position in the words above.

Of course, each column is scrambled, so you don't know which row each letter

came from. Cross out the letters in that column in the words you've already

unscrambled, and the ones that are left can help you solve the last few words.



In the example, the second letter of the third word is the only thing missing

in that column, so cross out all the letters below it. That leaves you with the

letter u. Similarly, the seventh word is either "saw" or "was", so look to see

which column has a w in it. Since only the first column under that word has a

w, the word must be "was". The gray bands should help you trace the columns

down the page.



[![fox-column]][fox-column]



Continue using the clues at the bottom to work out letters until you can solve

each word. You might also get hints from the surrounding story. If a column has

more than one missing word, check to see if any of the letters appear in only

one of the missing words. In the example, the second column has an r and a t

left. The second missing word doesn't contain t, so it must have the r. That

means that the first missing word has the t.



[![fox-deduction]][fox-deduction]



Once you unscramble all the words in a section, move on to the next section to

keep reading the story. If you need help or want to check your answer, see the

[solutions] page.



If you enjoy these puzzles, you might like my [Four-Letter Blocks] that combine

crossword puzzles with jigsaw puzzles. You can also find a complete list of my

[other projects].



[fox-start]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/images/fox-start.svg

[fox-easy]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/images/fox-easy.svg

[fox-column]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/images/fox-column.svg

[fox-deduction]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/images/fox-deduction.svg

[The Beggars]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/the-beggars.pdf

[Beyond Lies the Wub]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/beyond-lies-the-wub.pdf

[Christmas Presents, 1914]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/christmas-presents.pdf

[The Eyes Have It]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/the-eyes-have-it.pdf

[The Failure of Hope & Wandel]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/failure-of-hope-and-wandel.pdf

[The Feast of Nemesis]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/feast-of-nemesis.pdf

[The Funny Young Gentleman]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/the-funny-young-gentleman.pdf

[The Five Boons of Life]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/five-boons-of-life.pdf

[The Fox and the Grapes]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/fox-and-grapes.pdf

[Luck]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/luck.pdf

[Nyarlathotep]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/nyarlathotep.pdf

[The Talking-Out of Tarrington]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/the-talking-out-of-tarrington.pdf

[solutions]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/solutions

[Four-Letter Blocks]: https://donkirkby.github.io/four-letter-blocks/

[other projects]: https://donkirkby.github.io/



[Cain's Jawbone]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cain%27s_Jawbone

[shuffled pages solutions]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/shuffle-solutions

[The Advocate's Wedding-Day]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/the-advocates-wedding-day.pdf

[The Mass of Shadows]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/the-mass-of-shadows.pdf

[The Owl's Ear]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/the-owls-ear.pdf

[The Shadows on the Wall]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/the-shadows-on-the-wall.pdf

[The Signal-Man]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/the-signal-man.pdf



Story and image sources are listed on the [sources page].



[sources page]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/sources

[blog]: https://donkirkby.github.io/book-blender/blog

[mastodon]: https://hachyderm.io/@donkirkby