The GCHQ Puzzle Book: Perfect for anyone who likes a good headscratcher

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The colours of the lines are red, yellow, green, brown, blue, pink and black - which score 1,2,3,4,5,6 and 7 points respectively in Snooker. The first line is numbers with three letters, the second line is numbers with four letters, the third line is numbers with five letters. Finished (D over); ‘Town’ (Harris burg); Crossing (Hart ford), String (Con cord); Castle (Frank fort); Warble (Lan sing); Opera (Hono lulu).

The sequence is the list of cities that have hosted the Summer Olympics since 1960 (ROME, TOKYO, MEXICO CITY, MUNICH, MONTREAL, MOSCOW, LOS ANGELES, SEOUL, BARCELONA, ATLANTA, SYDNEY, ATHENS, BEIJING, LONDON) enciphered with the Olympiad designation (XVII OLYMPIAD, XVIII OLYMPIAD,…, XXX OLYMPIAD).Similarly for HELIUM (2), BORON (5), CARBON (6), SODIUM (11), PHOSPHORUS (15), CALCIUM (20), IRIDIUM (77), GOLD (79). f) CAN VAS, FLASK S, FLORI ST, I MA GO, MA INLAND, MA UVE, OR IG IN, TE ENS, V ARM INT, ZOOMING become US states when 2 letters are changed: CONNECTI ONS requires 3 letters to be changed. c) Three Men in a Boat (Jerome K Jerome) - There were four of us: George, and William Samuel Harris, and myself, and Montmorency. a) NAIVELY: the 14 7-letter words can be formed from the 98 non-blank tiles in a English Scrabble set.

Words rhyme with THE, QUICK, BROWN, FOX etc, and the complete sequence contains all the letters of the alphabet, like the original. All the other remaining states (CONNECTICUT, HAWAII, ILLINOIS, IOWA, MAINE, MINNESOTA, MISSOURI, NEW HAMPSHIRE, NEW MEXICO, OHIO, PENNSYLVANIA, RHODE ISLAND, SOUTH CAROLINA, WASHINGTON, WISCONSIN, WYOMING) contain the letter I. These are the smallest triples of consecutive numbers in each language where the last letter of a number is the first letter of its successor. a) Super Bowl winners: Green Bay Packers, Green Bay Packers, New York Jets, Kansas City Chiefs, Baltimore Colts, Dallas Cowboys, Miami Dolphins, Miami Dolphins, Pittsburgh Steelers, Pittsburgh Steelers, Oakland Raiders, Dallas Cowboys, Pittsburgh Steelers, Pittsburgh Steelers, Oakland Raiders, San Francisco 49ers, Washington Redskins, Los Angeles Raiders, San Francisco 49ers, Chicago Bears, New York Giants, Washington Redskins, San Francisco 49ers, San Francisco 49ers, New York Giants, Washington Redskins, Dallas Cowboys, Dallas Cowboys, San Francisco 49ers, Dallas Cowboys, Green Bay Packers, Denver Broncos, Denver Broncos, St. Thus ‘IN ECCLESIASTICAL USAGE THE TERM ESTABLISHMENT IS APPLIED TO’ enciphers to the text in the question.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. j) Ten Days That Shook the World (John Reed) - Towards the end of September 1917, an alien professor of Sociology visiting Russia came to see me in Petrograd.

Alternatively, for those who think 10 9 is one billion, the answer is: ‘One hundred and thirteen billion, three hundred and seventy-three million, three hundred and seventy-three thousand three hundred and seventy-three’, which has 124 letters. The 3 remaining words - linked by the word LINK - are (LINK) ARMS, CONNECTION (= LINK) and CHAIN (LINK). Countaphyt must have lost both their losing games 0-8 (to Apocrifal and Beaugas), as they gained no bonus points for losing by 7 or less.MINGLE is a synonym of MIX, which becomes 1000110 when each letter (all represent Roman numerals) is replaced by its decimal equivalent; similarly for APE/MIMIC/1000110001100. Loaf’ ( Baton Rouge); President ( Jefferson City); Small ( Little Rock); ‘Some’ ( Des Moines); Simon Templar ( Saint Paul); Musical (Oklahoma City); Claus ( Santa Fe). The GCHQ Puzzle Book 2, a new collection of head-scratching, mind-boggling and brain-bending puzzles is out now!

Photograph: Puffin/PA Puzzles For Spies is intended to inspire potential young codebreakers, linguists and mathematicians. Sam and Garden can be followed by Spade; Golf and Fight can be followed by Club - these are black suits. The list is the Roman numerals I, II, III, …, (part of) XXI with I, V, X replaced by 1, 5, 10 respectively. Two solutions depending on whether the element/planet at 4 down is chosen to be Mercury or Krypton (the home planet of Superman). The next name is TINA, so the answer could be a picture of Argentina, a Ford Cortina, a concertina, etc.

GCHQ’s unofficial chief puzzler, who identified himself only as Colin, said: “You don’t have to be a quiz champion, or even top of the class, to work at GCHQ. Broken and Purple can be followed by Heart; Rough and Baseball can be followed by Diamond - these are red suits in a pack of cards.