Scramble Squares: Cirque du Soleil

Here's a dazzling, death-defying (but always artistic) version of the Scramble Square challenge. Easy to Play, but Hard to Solve is the motto for this deceptively simple-looking puzzle. By the time you've become addicted and find yourself unable to solve the thing, you'll realize it's not so much a motto as a warning. Nine colorfully illustrated cardboard 4-by-4-inch squares depict various unfinished images of brilliant characters from the Cirque du Soleil along their edges. The images must be matched and the nine squares arranged in a larger square. An ingenious, elegantly executed puzzle idea, Scramble Squares will have you simultaneously blessing and cursing its inventor. --Claire Dederer