Code-Breaking Overtime

Posted on February 17, 2012 by fsdthreshold

Believe it or not, there’s one final chance to win an advance review copy of The Star Shard! Yes, I have one last ARC to give away. So if anyone has any puzzle-solving energy left, have at it!

Here are the rules:

1. It’s only fair to make former winners ineligible to win, but if you’re a former winner, you can still play! If you should happen to correctly solve the puzzle first, you and I will decide together which other player should receive the ARC.

2. This time, not everyone at the outset will be equally prepared to win. Any player could win, but you’ll require your hands as well as your head, and something more. If you do not have what it takes, my apologies. It’s no reflection upon you as a person! Any one of you can be as prepared as all the others with a short trip. Most of you are prepared already.

If this proves to be too hard in a day of play, I’ll provide a clue before long!

As before, the first person to solve this puzzle correctly is the winner, and I will send him/her an ARC. The contest is open as soon as this entry is posted.

Ready? What follows is a sentence in code. Tell me the sentence in English, and you win! Here is the code:

grape 16 green 21 ink 3 black 40 seed 5 page 1

blue 33 apple 16 cover 3 peel 4 stem 2 paper 13 red 23 rind 8.

 

These rhymes may help you a great deal:

Though friends went to an early grave,

He was from death by fever saved.

 

Born not far from the nether pole,

Behind a leaf he found a hole.

 

206 Responses to Code-Breaking Overtime

  1. fsdthreshold says:

    While you’re working on that, here’s a puzzle courtesy of my editor. (This has nothing to do with the puzzle above, and this one from the editor has no prize attached — except the satisfaction of having solved it!)

    The man on the corner couldn’t go home, because the man in the mask was there. Why couldn’t the man on the corner go home?

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Hi, Joe! Just start at the beginning of the puzzle and go forward to the end. That’s all I can say on that matter! 🙂

      Reply
  5. Hannah says:

    Well, like, paper, page, ink, and cover would go together, right? because they have to do with books, and then grapes and apples would go together because they’re both kinds of fruits, but then seeds and rinds and stems would go with apples as well… And then green, blue, black, and red go together because they’re colors. But then green could go to grape, black would go with ink (or blue!) and then red would go with apple (or green!) After all that, there are all those numbers to deal with… I am SO stumped right now.

    Reply
  6. Daylily says:

    I like word puzzles, but I’m not used to needing equipment to solve them. I wonder what we need. A book, maybe a dictionary? A fruit basket? A computer keyboard? A set of golden plates delivered by an angel?

    Reply
  7. fsdthreshold says:

    I’ll give a couple hints.

    These two rhymes may help you a great deal:

    Though friends went to an early grave,
    He was from death by fever saved.

    Born not far from the nether pole,
    Behind a leaf he found a hole.

    Reply
    • Hagiograph says:

      I normally like puzzles and would love to be able to crack this one, so I’m loathe to suggest to others what may be the answer at least to one of these rhymes. I am guessing (based on context and the facts in hand) that the first couplet refers to JRRT since he was invalided from fighting in WWI after contracting “trench fever” and spared. While a couple of his friends died in the war.

      Reply
      • Shieldmaiden says:

        and he was grading a students paper (leaf) when he found, or thought of, the Hobbit hole. He wrote the first line on that page.

        Reply
        • Swordlily says:

          And J. R. R. Tolkien was born in South Africa. This could be considered not far from the south “nether” pole. This is getting even more and more fascinating.

          Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      No, the puzzle doesn’t start until after “Here is the code.” In the post, I was only using italics for emphasis.

      You all are amazing! What team work!

      Reply
  10. Joe M says:

    I say a group effort. Fred is right we need to excercise more teamwork. I for one, am baffled. I haven’t seen a thing like this before.

    Reply
  11. Hagiograph says:

    I would be happier if it appeared to be some sort of cipher, but it seems more likely to be a “riddle” since the words seem to be symbolically linked “grape green ink”, “black seed page”, “blue apple cover”, as if each triplet is a “part of a book”, but it ends on a doublet (red rind). This is not a standard code that I can figure out. Perhaps he did us the disservice of calling a code when it was really a riddle.

    A code could be mapped by looking at things like commonality of letters (“e”, for example) or common terms (“the”) but this doesn’t seem to conform to anything like that kind of code.

    Reply
  12. Scott says:

    Fred noted in his post that is a sentence. Since there are 14 word/number pairs, I’m going with the idea that either:
    1) The word/number pairs go together to form words. (go to page/chapter/? “grape” and look for word number 16)
    2) The word or number are nulls (they don’t mean anything, they are just there to confuse.)

    I started out taking the words as nulls and counting the words coming after rule #1 in the post. In other words, I counted 16 words after the 1 which is “winner”. I came up with:
    winner if fair should make it’s I winner fair to only you’re should ineligible
    Which makes for some very interesting word combinations if you switch up the order. Fred messed up that theory after he said that you start at the beginning and go straight thru. He also said that the puzzle didn’t start until after “Here is the code”.

    Reply
  13. fsdthreshold says:

    Hagiograph, I think you will not be disappointed. This is indeed a code, not a riddle.

    Scott, in the two lines of code that constitute the puzzle, everything is important. There are no nulls.

    Yes: the puzzle doesn’t start until after “Here is the code.” The post above that is not part of it; it only explains the rules and conditions.

    I could give more hints, but you don’t appear to be stuck yet. You all appear to be doing well!

    My advice to “start at the beginning and go forward” was a response to a specific question about the order in which information was presented.

    Reply
    • Hagiograph says:

      No good reason? Breaking codes is fun, albeit amazingly difficult stuff. Remember, part of what won WWII were the folks at Bletchley Park.

      If this code can be cracked I have no doubt we will be able to figure out what Mr. Durbin’s nefarious plans are! So long in Japan he must surely have become quite familiar with the “Purple” code. Is there some plan afoot here to attack Midway again?

      Oh sure the winner gets an ARC copy of “The Star Shard” (probably delivered a couple days after it is released in the stores) but we LOSE MIDWAY!

      No good reason, indeed!

      Reply
  15. fsdthreshold says:

    At first I thought Mr. Brown Snowflake was smugly saying that he had cracked the code, but I guess he means that he’s content to watch the fun with brow unfurrowed. 🙂 (That’s how the elves stay so young-looking!)

    No, I don’t know about the “Purple” code — sounds like it would be a good story!

    No, the encoded sentence has nothing to do with attacking Midway. Heh, heh. Unless it’s so heavily encoded that I missed that nuance!

    I am painfully aware that ARCs are soon to go the way of too-ripe cheese . . . but I guess they’re still collector’s items, right? They may not be textually as good as the real, finished book, but they’re a part of history!

    Reply
  18. Morwenna says:

    I’m seeing that many of the words can be grouped by using an “inside, outside” focus.

    Outside (on a piece of fruit): peel, stem, rind.
    Inside: seed.

    Outside (on a book): cover
    Inside: ink, page, paper.

    The colors could be associated with all kinds of things, of course. But an apple’s peel is usually red or green. Ink is often black . . .

    Reply
    • Hagiograph says:

      Seems to me you are MOVING THE GOAL POSTS in mid-game! Suddenly it has to be a COHERENT english sentence? You didn’t specify that in the original rules.

      Besides where I come from (reading non-native english speakers writing patent disclosures) that would EASILY count as an english sentence.

      Coherent is another matter.

      Jeezly, play fair!

      Reply
  22. fsdthreshold says:

    Let me know if you want another hint. If at least three people ask for one, I’ll give it, but I’m afraid that further hints will lead you straight to the solution. The answer is there; someone just has to put the pieces together.

    If a few people say “Don’t give us a hint yet,” I’ll hold off for awhile.

    Reply
    • Hagiograph says:

      Actually it seems you may be overestimating us. (at least me).

      How ’bout if I post the entire text of the Hobbit here and we call it a day (because it’s probably a quote from the Hobbit somewhere). Your site will be shut down for gross copyright violation and I’ll walk away with a collector’s edition of the Star Shard. I sell it for a gross profit, buy the e-version at much lower cost and wind up with some cash while you fight with IP lawyers.

      Sounds fair to me. “Win-Win” as they say.

      Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      When I was getting my Pennsylvania driver’s license and was trying to read the tiny line of letters in the vision-testing machine, the sour-faced PennDOT guy said, “You’re guessing, Frederic.” (I just barely passed, but I think in another year or two, I’ll be bespectacled.)

      I say to you now, “You’re guessing, Mr. Brown Snowflake.” Heh, heh! And as Mr. Armstrong wrote on one of my physics tests in high school: “Very impressive! But alas, not quite correct.” 🙂 (I did my best to get through physics with creative writing skills. The tactic met with limited success.)

      Reply
  24. fsdthreshold says:

    Okay. I’m giving you guys a hint, whether you want it or not.

    Melon, indigo, margin, banana —
    Avail yourselves of the wisdom of Hannah.

    Reply
    • Hannah says:

      Ah, my name is always rhymed with banana. I don’t even really like bananas! Unless it’s with peanut butter.. But that’s not the point, is it, Hannah? No, it’s not. Then FOCUS, Hannah! FOCUS!!

      Reply
    • Shieldmaiden says:

      Maybe you were on the right track earlier Hannah. You said:
      “Well, like, paper, page, ink, and cover would go together, right? because they have to do with books, and then grapes and apples would go together because they’re both kinds of fruits, but then seeds and rinds and stems would go with apples as well… And then green, blue, black, and red go together because they’re colors. But then green could go to grape, black would go with ink (or blue!) and then red would go with apple (or green!) After all that, there are all those numbers to deal with.”
      But besides our hands and head, what do we need?

      Reply
  25. Joe M says:

    That would mean it all goes together in a way. So the numbers may not mean a thing or maybe…………….Nice try Scott. I have two teams of code crackers working on this. I will have the answer soon.

    Reply
  26. fsdthreshold says:

    Hannah, I’m sorry for rhyming your name with “banana.” 🙂 I just had to get a hint across. I know what you mean — all through my school years, people were obsessed with rhyming the name “Fred” with a bunch of things, too.

    Remember, Joe, you need both the words and the numbers in those two lines of code.

    Reply
    • Shieldmaiden says:

      Right! But I am not giving up, This is a pretty difficult code to crack. I’m better at riddles. I have been through an assortment of possibilities, over and over again. Like Hannah I’d also noticed the connections to the words on the puzzle list, but then couldn’t get it to lead anywhere. I am sure now, do to the hint, that it is there somewhere, but I didn’t see it then and I still don’t see it now. I’ve tried putting the words in order numerically: page 1 stem 2 ink 3 cover 3 peel 4 rind 8 paper 13 grape 16 apple 16 green 21 red 23 blue 33 black 40. I’ve noticed that there were two 16’s (which make apple green). There are also two 3’s for ink and cover (which go together). All the colors can connect to something on the list which consists of either food or book related items. I then tried to assign a letter of the alphabet to each number by counting out the letters to that number and got: grape P green U ink C black N seed E page A blue G apple P cover C peel D stem B paper M red W rind H. Or: 16, 21, 3, 40, 5, 1, 33, 16, 3, 4, 2, 13, 23, 8 = pucneagpcdbmwh. And for one tiny second while I was decoding I got excited when I saw: p UCNE “you see any” but then agpcdbmwh was nothin’. And nothing is still what I have. Although I don’t see any, I am still looking through The Hobbit too. I started out looking in Dragonfly before the first clue rolled in because it’s a book most of us would already have. However after the JRRT clue I knew most of us also had The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings on hand. And as stated in the rules, any one who didn’t have what it takes could be as prepared as all the others with a short trip. I guessed that trip would have to be to the library. Fred keeps saying we need to start at the beginning (of the puzzle) and go forward to the end. I think of all the books that The Hobbit is probably the most like the beginning, but who knows? Maybe the beginning is only for the puzzle and not the book. I would have searched the book with greater commitment had I not also been discouraged by the knowledge of the page numbers being so inconsistent do to all the different versions. So it can’t be page count. I looked up how many chapters on day one of the puzzle and nothing goes up to 40. Maybe word count is it then? I guess it is time to try that. [insert deep sigh here] Basically I am as close as I was on day one after reading it over a few times. Aside from having switched from Dragonfly to The Hobbit of course and ruling out a bunch of ideas that went no where, ha ha. I guess knowing the right book is something, if in fact this is the right book that is. I hope someone gets it, but don’t tell yet Fred, there are still four days till the release of The Star Shard. Someone has to get it by then, right??? Probably won’t be me though. We need our hands as well as our head, and something more! Even deeper sigh…

      Reply
  28. Swordlily says:

    I’ve been trying to find the answer in Tolkien’s books. I figure that extra something has to be a book. . . . and the Lord of the Rings would be the one book series Fred would assume that almost everyone would have. . . . . and his other clues point to Tolkien, too.
    I’ve been counting chapters and words. But nothing is consistent.
    I’ve come up with the theory that the three types of things, the fruit related stuff, the colors, and the book related stuff refer to three different. . . somethings. . . books, chapters. . . And the numbers after the words could refer to words within the chapters. . . or books.
    I don’t know whether to look in the Hobbit or the Lord of the Rings. Or both, or none.
    There, that all I’ve got
    I am so stuck. . . .

    Reply
  29. Hannah says:

    @Fred: No, it’s okay 😉 haha. I get side-tracked easily..

    @Swordlily: I’ve tried that, too, and it doesn’t work for me either. But I was using the Hobbit, not Lord of the Rings since I don’t actually own any of them myself! But, as one of my friends pointed out (the one who suggested making Hobbit holes) we would need to know the edition of the book.. So it can’t really be that.. I dunno, it could be maybe.

    Reply
  31. Scott says:

    You go girls! Good Luck!

    @Hannah: You are right about needing the right edition. If the numbers refer to page numbers, they won’t be the same in every edition. But, the words themselves will be in the same order in every (English) copy. I saw the words blue, apple, and cover and wondered if we needed the Apple IPad version. Hopefully the numbers mean something other than pages.

    It will probably take some trial and error to find the answer. Too bad I can’t help you on that. My copies of The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings are where I can’t get to them and it doesn’t make sense to buy books in order to win a book.

    Reply
    • Hagiograph says:

      I think the general consensus is “NO! No we will NOT figure this out! We steadfastly REFUSE to figure this out.”

      Having said that here’s my guess:

      “Grape-sick teens, agreein’ to one ink, three black for….O’ SEEDS! fipage, one blew thirty three apple-sick teens over three peels, forced ’em to pay per thirteen red to three rind ate.”

      If I’m not mistaken that sounds like SHAKESPEARE. So why all the Tolkein hints?????? (And which Shakespearean drama featured so many teens? Clearly Romeo and Juliet).

      FTW!

      Reply
      • Daylily says:

        I like your guess! It has a certain ring to it. Maybe I’ll set it to music. Rap music, I think. With accordion riffs at beginning, middle, and end! 🙂

        Reply
    • Scott says:

      Do you remember the riddle that Fred threw at us when we played Dungeons and Dragons? We couldn’t do anything until we solved it.

      What can go up a chimney down but can’t go down a chimney up?

      Reply
      • fsdthreshold says:

        I remember that riddle, but I’d forgotten that I posed it to the D&D group! Wow! So I messed around with puzzles even then . . . No wonder I was such an irritating DM!

        Remember the riddle of Ralsoth’s chamber? “When in, stay out. When out, go in. When in, stay in. When out, go out.”

        That one’s not original with me; I think my dad heard it on a TV show. For everyone who wasn’t there, it had to do with water that flooded the entrance chamber to a good, wise, powerful being’s chamber and sometimes prevented entrance or departure. You could only go in when the water was out, etc.

        Reply
  35. Scott says:

    On a completely different subject, has anyone used or heard 1st hand reports on Dragon Voice Recognition Software? I’ve heard advertisements for it lately and I’m curious. If it works anywhere near as well as they advertise, keyboards will be a thing of the past.

    Reply
  38. Joe M says:

    Wait a minute he said above that it would require our hands and our head. That could have been a hint. I mean apart from typing what have we really used our hands for thus far.

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Exactly, Joe! You are so right! Head, hands, and something else! Either you are fully prepared, or a short trip will fully prepare you. The Internet can also provide amazing things.

      Reply
  39. fsdthreshold says:

    Yes, Shieldmaiden! An umbrella is the answer to the riddle Scott mentioned. That was one my grandma used to tell.

    I am about an inch away from writing out a detailed summary of all the hints and facts you’ve gleaned and received so far! Does anyone out there care to do it instead? You’ll feel much better about the solution if you put it together yourselves! 🙂

    Reply
  40. Shieldmaiden says:

    OK, so even melon, indigo, margin, and banana fall into the fruit, color, and book pattern. Some of the items in the list even go together aside from grouping. So I started “at the beginning” and listed items by category. I began with grape because it is first and put all the fruit together. Then just like UCNE, I was excited for a few seconds when it began: grape seed and apple peel. But then the connections stopped. I still need to figure out the numbers. Maybe nothing in the sentence needs to move, maybe the numbers just need to change into words or letters? Did Tolkien write a book about colorful fruit? How did I miss it if he did? Seems more like Lud-in-the-Mist. 🙂

    Reply
  41. Hagiograph says:

    I swear the final answer BETTER require some sort of cryptography and not be mostly metaphorically derived or I’m personally planning on scratching Pittsburgh off my maps.

    It has to be something from the Hobbit. Not just because of the reference to finding him in a hole (earlier hint) but also since Tolkien really likes to obsess on beginnings and endings (as do Bilbo and various characters in The LOTR). I thought at first it must have to do with the “Road Goes ever On…” But cannot get to the grapes. Or blue apples for that matter.

    Reply
  42. fsdthreshold says:

    Hagiograph, this is pure cryptography. There’s no metaphor whatsoever. It’s a code. I firmly believe you will be satisfied with its nature as a code.

    Don’t make too big a deal out of the “beginnings and endings” idea — again, I was answering Joe when that came up. He asked if the numbers came first, or the words, and I said, “Start at the beginning and work forward.” I was answering that question from him. I was telling him, “Look at what’s there in front of you. There’s no need to ask about the order.”

    Reply
    • Hagiograph says:

      Seems to defy “frequency” analysis since the words are all actual words. So it isn’t a regular “monoalphabetic substitution cypher”. Even the most common character (“e” at 23% of the regular letters puts it in the same rank as the letter “e” in regular english –top– albeit somewhat higher than e normally occurs).

      Obviously the numbers cannot be letter locations unless you use some sort of “modulo” type counting where you circle back around, otherwise we wouldn’t have numbers like “40” and “33”.

      When I plug in the numbers by their actual letters the counts still come in with “e” and “t” as the most common letters which is true for standard english (!)

      Reply
  43. Shieldmaiden says:

    Ok, two more days and The Star Shard officially releases! I say that if none of us are any closer at that point that we get to ask Fred yes or no questions. Like: Is The Hobbit the something more? What do you all think?

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Oooh! This is a perfect setup line for you to deliver Eowyn’s line, Shieldmaiden! Joe says, “I like that idea, Shield Man!” You pull off your helmet, let the wind fill your flowing hair, and say . . .

      🙂

      Reply
  45. fsdthreshold says:

    Okay. I won’t tell you anything you don’t already know, but I’m going to summarize what you’ve either been told or put together for yourselves.

    1. Not everyone, at the outset, will be equally prepared. You will require your head, hands, and something more. A short trip will prepare even those who are initially unprepared.

    2. The solution is one English sentence. That sentence is written in code. A code needs only to be translated from code to English.

    3. Two rhyming couplets led you to J.R.R. Tolkien, which I said would help you a great deal.

    4. Hannah pointed out some relationships among the words. They’re not random. They seem to belong to distinct groups.

    5. I said to start at the beginning of the code and go forward: word number word number, etc.

    6. There are no “nulls,” as Scott considered. Everything in the two lines of code is important. You need the words, and you need the numbers.

    7. Morwenna returned to the idea, in Comment #18, that the words belong to distinct groups.

    8. When I pointed you back to Hannah’s ideas, I suggested more words that might help you: “melon, indigo, margin, banana.” This is not a part of the code, but it can help you to understand the code.

    9. Shieldmaiden’s words are wise in her comment on my #24 comment.

    10. Shieldmaiden pointed out that 3 occurs twice. There’s a 3 after ink and a 3 after cover. Interesting. I wonder what the significance of that is?

    11. Joe makes a great point in Comment #38.

    In the words of Han Solo: “Okay, kid, you’re all clear! Now let’s blow this thing and go home!”

    Reply
    • Shieldmaiden says:

      There is also a 16 after grape and another 16 after apple! Does the 3 occurring twice have more significance than the 16 occurring twice? Someone IS going to figure this out, I can feel it.

      Reply
  46. Hannah says:

    Is the short trip to be to the grocery store? Do we need to go out and buy a bunch of grapes and count the seeds? haha…….

    Reply
  47. Joe M says:

    Not a terrible idea Hannah. Sorry SHEILDMAIDEN. Ha ha. I read it wrond I have eye problems. It’s a long story. I won’t bore you.

    Reply
  49. jhagman says:

    I would have thought that Chris would have solved the code using his Cray Home Computer. My copy of “The Star Shard” has arrived,,,should I read it now, or save it for my favorite time of reading, the days between Halloween and Christmas,,,? That is my pleasant dilemma.

    Reply
    • Shieldmaiden says:

      A pleasant dilemma indeed. READ IT NOW! How can you not? And when you do, meet me on Goodreads for reviews and discussion. How did you get a copy the day before it releases? I read the ARC already, but my per-ordered copy should be here tomorrow or the day after… and I am reading it again.
      Happy reading to you!!

      Reply
  50. I am Mr. Brown Snowflake says:

    Just a slight correction, jhagman: Chris has a Cray2. The only models in existence that I am aware of are at the University of Illinois, the one at Cheyanne Mtn (NORAD) and the one at Langley. I believe he has the only “home version” of the Cray2; ohh, aside from Al Gore, of course.

    Reply
  51. jhagman says:

    Hello Maiden W/Shield, Fred’s book did not have what we call a SOS (strict on sale) date, Ingram (or some other shopper) has been showing inventory for weeks. My copy has been in our store since last week, but it is only now that I can afford it,,, it is a very pretty book and well worth the wait!

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Oh, my goodness, Preacher! Thank you! That is a wonderful film! Everyone, you have GOT to click on this link and watch it! As our friend Marquee says: “God bless the storytellers and those who love them!” Thank you, Preacher! What a celebration!

      Yes — today is the official day that The Star Shard comes into the world!

      Reply
      • Hagiograph says:

        The saddest part of the film short is that Mr. Lessmore ultimately had to resort to “self publication”. Probably used a small vanity press.

        Congrats on yet another notch in your publishing belt, Fred! (And not self-published!)

        🙂

        Reply
        • fsdthreshold says:

          Thank you, Hagiograph!

          I’ve often thought about that subject. From our perspective in the early 21st century, we tend to forget that, for nearly all of human history, writers were self-published. That’s just the way it worked. It was only in fairly recent times that publishing became an industry warded by gatekeepers in New York (and other major world cities) with their iron key rings. And I think the day is not far off when (if the human race is still here), publishing will mostly be done by individuals again. I’m pretty sure you’d agree, knowing what you know about recent trends in technology.

          Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Thank you very much, Mr. Brown Snowflake! It means a whole, whole lot that you are rejoicing with me today! The paths of life have not always been easy, but they have always been blessed.

      My prayer is that this “rocket” does well enough that 1.) many readers can discover and enjoy the world of The Star Shard, and 2.) I can go on writing books and stories. And I pray that we’ll all be rejoicing together at the launching of every one!

      Reply
  55. fsdthreshold says:

    Thank you, too, jhagman, for getting a copy of The Star Shard! And you, too, Shieldmaiden! I think you two are officially the first two people I know who have bought copies of the real thing. (I know there was a trickle of sales before the release date, because it wasn’t a precise release date, as is assigned to more famous books.)

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Thank you, Mr. Brown Snowflake! It’s in the system for Barnes & Noble. That means that the company at large has a certain number of the books, and they decide how many copies to send to which physical stores. (Is my understanding on this correct, jhagman?) So hopefully, you’ll see it on the shelf at B&N. If you don’t, they can easily order it. I don’t know exactly what other stores will be stocking it, but if you go to the page for The Star Shard on my web site here, there’s a list of six vendors. It’s available from all of those. As for independent stores (God bless the independent stores!), it’s up to them what books they carry.

      For anyone who has the energy and inclination to help me out: the very best thing you can do, if you are planning to order a copy or two for, say, those little cousins of yours — go to a physical bookstore in your area, be it big or small, and order the book(s) through them. Chances are, if someone (you) does that, the staff member/manager will go, “Hmm,” and order a couple extra copies to put on the store shelf. Thus, you will have placed The Star Shard in a store that might not otherwise have ordered it! If anyone does this, you have my profoundest thanks! 🙂

      Reply
      • Shieldmaiden says:

        Is it an advantage to have your book in Libraries or not? More people will read it, but less will then buy it, so I am not sure which is best. I did buy a couple extra copies to give as gifts and can donate one to my library (they carry Cricket and Cicada etc.) if that is helpful. What thinks you?

        Reply
      • jhagman says:

        Fred’s new book is “in system” for B@N, that means they can order it through a wholesaler, or even issue a purchase order to get it direct from the publisher- Fred should be promoting the book with author readings and signings. Fred can contact his closest B@N, and meet with a CRM (Community Relations Manager) show them the book and book a signing. YA fantasy sells extremely well for bookstores.

        Reply
  57. Swordlily says:

    Congratulations on the launch of the long awaited the Star Shard. I still need to get my copy. Well I already own the ARC, but I want one of this pretty hardcovers. And I want to read it again!!!

    Reply
  58. Hannah says:

    The closest Barnes and Noble around here is nearly an hour away! Since our only book and movie store have both closed, we have to substitute with Target instead 😉 But oh yes, yes, yes! Congratulations on The Star Shard being published!! Yay!!!

    Reply
  59. fsdthreshold says:

    Shieldmaiden, it IS an advantage to have the book in libraries! It’s a chance for many more readers to encounter it. Some may fall in love with the book and then want to buy their own copy or give copies as presents to others. YES, it’s very good to have it in libraries! Thank you so much for donating one to a library! And bravo to your library for carrying Cricket and Cicada! So many libraries nowadays don’t, and they all should!

    Here’s some TREMENDOUS news just in from Marquee Movies! A person he knows found the book in a store in Florida, and there were “several copies”! That’s a wonderful sign, when stores have more than a single copy! I would love to hear reports like this from you all, wherever in this great nation you may be (or overseas, Tim)!

    Thank you, too, Swordlily and Hannah!

    Reply
  61. Joe M says:

    Who won? I don’t recall seeing that anybody won. We just kinda veered off topic……..Anyways Fred congats. Hope you have a bestseller on your hands here. 🙂

    Reply
    • Hagiograph says:

      Turns out I won with my guess:

      “Grape-sick teens, agreein’ to one ink, three black for….O’ SEEDS! fipage, one blew thirty three apple-sick teens over three peels, forced ‘em to pay per thirteen red to three rind ate.”

      I know it’s weird, but I was just as surprised as you that “fipage” is some sort of neologism for “first page”. Who knew?

      Well, congratulations to me. Thank you, thank you. As I said, all it took was superior mental powers and a strong appreciation for Shakespearian prose.

      Reply
    • Hagiograph says:

      MINOR DISCOURSE ON THE MEANING OF THE CODED SENTENCE:

      I know it will be important to understand the meaning of the coded message which I obviously correctly guessed, so here it is.

      “Grape-sick teens, agreein’ to one ink, three black for….O’ SEEDS! fipage, one blew thirty three apple-sick teens over three peels, forced ‘em to pay per thirteen red to three rind ate.”

      Grape-sick teens is obviously a reference to drunken youths who are planning on “tagging” (“agreein’ to ink) or possibly planning on tattooing someone.

      “O! Seeds!” is a common expression among young Veronese youth and roughly translates into something about “ejaculate” or possibly small bits of something, but idiomatically it is just an expression of contempt.

      On the “fipage” (first page, obviously a reference to the first place the teens were going to either put grafitti on or were planning on tattooing) one obviously gunned down a group of three _other_ teenagers who were drunk on cider (“apple-sick teens”) in a brutal gang turf warfare (remember, this is probably part of the original Romeo and Juliet) when they got into a disagreement over some “apple peels” (obviously a metaphor for “money”…green paper, peels you get the picture).

      Hence the “forced them to pay “thirteen red” (a famous Victorian phrase for “blood”, made them pay in blood).

      Finally in victory the “grape-sick teens” gang enjoyed some pork rinds (as was the fashion in 17th Century England, obviously a license Shakespeare took to assume that Veronese youth would celebrate in the same way.

      QED

      Reply
  62. Scott says:

    Belated Congratulations on your publishing date! I ordered 3 copies last week. I ordered one for me, one for my step-daughter, and one for my grandson. I started to order them online, but changed my mind. Fred, in memory of your parents, I decided to order them thru a small privately owned bookstore where I live in Assumption, IL called “Just Books”. We need to support these small bookstores whenever we can. (No offense to your meal-ticket JHagman!)

    Reply
  63. I am Mr. Brown Snowflake says:

    Scott: I, too, would have happily ordered from a locally-owned bookstore in honor of The Book Center, but the little podunk town of 8k I live in does not have one. Des Moines (metro pop 400K) might have a few, but if so I do not know where they are, so I resorted to Amazon.

    Reply
  64. Hagiograph says:

    Hilarious! I went on to B&N (I’ll double check our local bricks and mortar B&N before I buy via online), but they had an hilarious snippet from the Kirkus Review. I have excerpted the funniest parts:
    ————————————————
    Kirkus Reviews
    …buckles under a preposterous physical setting. Cymbril lives aboard the Thunder Rake, a “wheeled city” on a wagon…

    Another logic flaw big enough to drive a wagon city through is the Rake’s ability, despite being of city-width, to abruptly steer left or right to avoid an obstacle…”
    ——————————————–
    I am uncertain if the person who wrote this ever read “fiction” before, let alone fantasy fiction or anything even marginally “whimsical” in nature.

    Honestly; who goes through and assess the “logic” of fantasty novels for children????

    Oh, OK, I probably have…but gimme a break…I’m a *&^*&in’ SCIENTIST…and there’s NO WAY Alice could go _through_ a looking glass without breaking it and hurting herself….you’d have to tunnel all the electrons simultaneously which is highly, HIGHLY unlikely! Sheesh!

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Boy, those are terrible reviews from Voya and Kirkus! Yikes! Just for the record, there have been great pro reviews, too, from The Bulletin and Booklist. Boy, I’m still shuddering from those two on B&N. Wow . . .

      Reply
      • fsdthreshold says:

        A little comfort: I have heard from a professional source that Kirkus encourages negative reviews so that they can bill themselves as “the world’s toughest book critics.” That makes me feel a little better — and also that the reviewer’s gripes stemmed mostly from not being able to accept the physics of the Thunder Rake, which is set up immediately on page 1, so the reader knows what to expect.

        If you can steer the Titanic around icebergs, you can steer the Thunder Rake around large objects. (Both vessels have their problems when the drivers are overconfident and inattentive.)

        Reply
        • Hagiograph says:

          If their goal is to be “the toughest book critics,” maybe they should focus on content rather than merely being “tough.” I can be tough by simply insulting someone without merit or rationale. That doesn’t mean I’m providing any value to the planet.

          Reply
          • fsdthreshold says:

            So the lowest tier of life is being a teacher at the school for critics who critique the teachers at critics’ school.

      • Hagiograph says:

        Oh puhleeze, anyone who starts off a review of a children’s fantasy novel _assessing the logical bases_ of the predicate details isn’t even worth having committed to print, let alone _listening_ to! That was an absurd ditty. What could the author of that review have been thinking? Personally if I were you I’d be laughing my *** off that someone actually felt that was a viable “review” of a fantasy novel!

        But, in future, if you need any scientific consulting on things, just give me a ring. We can ensure that the ENGINEERING details are worked out, and how things like skeleton men can walk around without connective tissue and muscles…you know… the “logic” stuff. (I will, however, demand either a co-authorship or at least a cut of that sweeeeeeeeet royalty money!)

        Reply
  66. Treefrog says:

    Nice website you have here Durbin. I remember reading “The Star Shard” in Cricket magazine (It was what got me reading Cricket). Anyway, I promised if the “The Star Shard” ever became a book that I’d buy it. Well, I’m glad to say I kept my promise, the book came in the mail a few days ago and I enjoyed reading the book tremendously (count me in for any sequels or new books!). “The Star Shard” is now proudly sitting on on my “to be re-read shelf”.

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Wow! Thank you, Treefrog! If that story got you reading Cricket, then I did you a service! Were you one of the readers who wrote in during that year when I was answering questions on Cricket‘s site? Anyway, I’m deeply honored that you thought enough of the story to buy the book, and overwhelmed with joy that you are keeping it on the re-read shelf! I hope you’ll stick around here on the blog, too!

      Reply
      • Treefrog says:

        You’re welcome, and yes, I was one of those readers who wrote in on Cricket‘s site. I’m surprised you remembered! And don’t worry, I’ll check in on the blog every now and then.

        Reply
        • fsdthreshold says:

          That’s great! There are several regular readers of the blog who are teenagers (which I’m guessing you are) — and lots of fantasy fiction readers! You’d fit right in!

          Reply
    • Hagiograph says:

      Thanks. It was a lot of intense work. I had to generate an entire algorithm to crack the code. But perseverence pays off in the end.

      I’d like to remind all the kids to stay in school and eat healthy and study lots of science so you, too, can become a professional code-breaker like me.

      Reply
  68. Joe M says:

    Don’t take reviews too harshly. Anyone who is not named Rick Riordan has a bad review from a lot of sites. I am no fantasy guy. But Edgar Allan Poe had faulty logic and his works sell better now than they did then. Not to say yours has faulty logic; I was just comparing you to Edgar Allan Poe. Your story line kinda makes me think of something he would do.

    Reply
  69. fsdthreshold says:

    So, what do you guys want to do about this contest? Do you want me to declare a time up and tell you the solution, so that we can move on with our lives? 🙂 It’s time for a new blog post . . .

    Alternatively, I could give you one giveaway hint that would almost guarantee that someone would break the code very quickly. It is a “giveaway” contest, after all . . .

    Reply
  70. fsdthreshold says:

    Is this better on the time? I think I’ve got it set to the correct time now.

    I’ve posted a couple of the new professional reviews of The Star Shard on the home page and on the book’s page. I need the Webmaster’s help to change what’s in the box.

    I visited one local Barnes & Noble today. The books weren’t on the shelf yet, but the helpful staff member believes they’ll be there this week! Jhagman, she also gave me the business card of a CRM — thanks for the tip. I will be doing launchings at two independent stores, but why not try something at B&N, too?

    So that’s one vote for an extreme hint. Anyone else? 🙂

    Reply
  73. fsdthreshold says:

    Thanks, Daylily!

    Okay, that’s three votes for an extreme hint. In honor of the changing month and the release of the book, let’s put this code out of its misery.

    Right away, Hannah noticed that the words in the code belong to three groups. Then I told you to think “J.R.R. Tolkien.”

    Tolkien. Three. Does that help? It’s a code. When you have the key, you can unlock the code.

    Reply
    • Shieldmaiden says:

      Vilya, Nenya, Narya?

      The 3 could refer to being the Third Part of the one book to rule them all. I looked forever last week at The Angerthas (Appendix E) in hopes it was a key code of some kind, as it had 56 charters and I needed 40. But alas… still nada.

      This code is hard even knowing all we know. I can’t believe we actually attempted to solve it without the Tolkien clue at the beginning. I believe there is an answer but I can not solve it. Maybe something will come to me overnight. Sighs.

      Tolkien. Three.

      Reply
  74. fsdthreshold says:

    It was really never intended to be very hard. Remember, it’s a code. Look at those two lines of text. You just have to translate them from code into English.

    There’s “grape,” followed by “16.” “Green,” followed by “21.” “Ink,” followed by “3.” And so on.

    I said that you needed your head (mind), hands (to hold things, to write), and something else (the key). The combination of “Tolkien” and “three” should give you the key.

    You don’t have to be brilliant or a scholar to solve it (I’m neither). You don’t have to know obscure Tolkien trivia. You probably will need a pencil or pen and piece of paper, unless you have a very good memory.

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      That’s a good idea, Joe, but remember, the answer is a sentence — a complete sentence, not a word or phrase. (And no, it doesn’t have to do with January 3rd. But that’s good thinking!)

      Reply
  76. I am Mr. Brown Snowflake says:

    “Three” does not necessarily indicate a reference to the Three Rings of the Elves. The really big three in JRR’s world were The Silmarils, but our host is much more a LOTR fan than he ever was of The Silmarillion (my own haunt, thank you)

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Exactly. You could not be any warmer. Our host is a LOTR fan.

      It’s a code. You’re trying to find the key that will unlock the code.

      Reply
      • Shieldmaiden says:

        And the key is not The Angerthas in Part Three, The Return of the King, right? But may still possibly be found in Part III of The Lord of the Rings? Tolkien, Three, LOTR. Hmmm. Not intended to be hard… I believe you, but I am not nearly as smart as I had once believed. And you cracked this code yourself, Fred? You didn’t make it up? I think that you posses far more scholarly brilliance than you think you do.

        I am still trying to figure it out though. I am not any closer, but you never know when it will click, so I am hanging in there. Or, we could just leave it as the unsolvable code and go on with our lives, and new posts could continue, and one day, years and years from now someone will happen along and solve it! 🙂

        Reply
        • fsdthreshold says:

          No, the key is not the Angerthas. “Part III” is a good phrase to keep in your mind, but that’s not all you should have in your mind.

          LOTR. Three. Words belonging to three groups. Numbers.

          I don’t think we can leave it unsolved. Wouldn’t you all be too frustrated by that?

          Well, I didn’t “crack” the code myself — I created it. So you KNOW it can’t be too hard!

          Reply
  77. Joe M says:

    I’m a pro and I hat science. There isn’t a 39 clues code that I didn’t break. and this is nothing like those.

    Reply
  79. Joe M says:

    I don’t know but remember my friends, the longer you brainstorm the sooner the anwer smacks you between the eyes.

    Reply
  82. Joe M says:

    In that case we could assume that group 1 we’ll say is books would be, pages ink and cover. In group 2 we have all of our colors. (DUH) and group 3 would be grapes, apples, seeds, peels, stems, rinds. Don’t forget either that all of those colors could be like red apple black ink. green grapes. Think through that in the mean time I sorted the groups now we just need to figure out how to get them into a sentance.

    Reply
    • Shieldmaiden says:

      The first, second, and third part of the one book? The Lord of the Rings? It can’t be the 3 rings of power, even though there is a one ring and a three rings. But we already think it is the third part, or The Return of the King, or at least I did. I can’t figure out how this is more information? Maybe it is, but I can’t figure it out. I will still try, and seeing as how I’m a night person, I am requesting the answer wait until morning if that’s agreeable to everyone. I want to give it one more go. But don’t hold your breath, if you could see the things I have tried you would get dizzy!!

      The Return of the King, three, numbers, Tolkien…

      Reply
    • Hannah says:

      The Lord of the Rings, which is now printed as three separate books, was originally thought by Tolkien to just be an entire one book, but for some reason it was more expensive to print one whole long book at the time, so they split it into three (which I for one am grateful for). But we already know it has something to do with LOTR so what I said is pretty much useless at this point..

      Reply
      • Shieldmaiden says:

        It is not exactly three separate books, if I understand it right, but three parts of one book (to rule them all). He wrote it as one book but it was published in three parts. So I do not think it is technically a trilogy, but I don’t know for sure. I am also glad it is split up as three.

        And still have not gotten any closer to the answer.

        Reply
  84. Hagiograph says:

    This seems to defy any sort of numerical analysis. There’s only two “values” that repeat rendering any sort of internal system far too advanced to crack that way. Even taken as single values the two digit numbers don’t lend any really valuable leads. I thought maybe “1” and “6” would fit with “of” and “the” so you get “Grape 1 6 Green” as “Fellowship OF THE Ring” and “apple 1 6 cover” as “Return OF THE King” that leads no where because intervening is a “3” “3” so if the nubmers represent articles and prepositions you have something repeated.

    There’s simply too little information within the code itself to apply a transform of any sort. Character counts (even spelling out the numbers) result in percentages of characters that almost match the English language usage (ie: “e” recurs a lot which is common within English sentences, so there’s no clear transform to a simple replacement cipher).

    We kinda get the “clues” all pointing to LotR and JRRT which is all fine and dandy but subsequent clues have done little to clarify anything more than “it’s related to LotR and JRRT.

    If there was some sort of “transform” that could be applied that made any sense we’d expect to see some things repeating in certain patterns.

    If it is as “simple” a code as Fred indicates it to be one would think he isn’t invoking some “key” that changes as the characters/words accumulate.

    I personally give up as it is simply annoying the **** out of me at this point.

    I for one request the solution post haste (even if via e-mail) so that I may critique Fred’s discussion of the codes “simplicity” and the nature of the code.

    Or be so blown away by its cleverness that I am rendered speechless.

    Either way; make the *****in’ pain end.

    Reply
  85. fsdthreshold says:

    All right. Clearly, this is ceasing to be fun and moving into the realm of “annoying” (or maybe it crossed the border a long time ago)!

    Unless some of you object strongly, I think it’s time to call a time up.

    I’ll give you the rest of the day, because I think any of you could easily now break the code. Before I go to bed tonight, I will see that the solution and explanation are posted here one way or another, either by one of you or by me.

    Sound good?

    Reply
  86. I am Mr. Brown Snowflake says:

    Speaking only for myself (duh) old friend, I would say I was annoyed with it the minute I saw it. Get it over with! Move on!

    Old Tom Bombadil is a merry fellow
    bright blue is his hat and his boots are yellow

    Reply
  87. Swordlily says:

    Well from everything Fred is saying the “three” refers to the three books in the Lord of the Rings.
    But how that’s is a key I cannot figure out. Me and my siblings tried to use the table of contents from the books to crack the code, but there isn’t a 33rd chapter in any of the books. And then we tried counting into the first chapters of each book, assuming that the three categories each point to one of the books and the numbers refers to a word. We came up with some funny sentences, but nothing really coherent.

    Reply
  88. Scott says:

    Again, I don’t have copies of the books where I can get to them easily, but I’m throwing an idea out there to see if it helps.

    The duplication of the number 3 pointed us to the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Could the duplication of the number 16 be pointing us to Chapter 16 of each book?

    Reply
    • Shieldmaiden says:

      I thought it was the three things that showed us the LOTR (book items, fruits, and colors). The two 3’s and16’s I thought meant something else. I will go look at chapters 3 and 16 now. Supposedly we are “close” and one of us should “easily” solve it. Ha ha. Right. I wish you could go to a library and look at the book for a while, maybe you could do it if you had one handy. I do not think we are going to make it before late, late, late tonight.

      Reply
  89. fsdthreshold says:

    Shieldmaiden, I think my “late night” is pretty much “morning” to everyone else, so it’s okay, isn’t it, if I post the solution late, late, laaate tonight? But the way you’re all going, it may not come to that!

    Remember on The X Files how “the Smoking Man” would always say to Agent Mulder, “You’re close”? (At least I think he said that. That’s how my memory has it, anyway.) Well, I don’t smoke, but I’m saying, “You’re close. You’re awfully close.”

    Good luck in these final hours of the contest!

    Reply
    • Hagiograph says:

      I am uncertain how “you’re close” applies in any conceivable way to this discussion. Everyone seems to be meandering around the fact that it relates to the Trilogy of the LotR by JRRT. The real problem is, in order to be close, I’d think we should at least be on the trail of an actual sentence.

      It’s like telling me I’m close to Pluto simply by walking west about 3 steps.

      I honestly can’t wait now to see what “close” means when the answer is revealed.

      As I said earlier I can think of no “transforms” that can be run on the data to provide something akin to a sentence in english unless I use an Enigma machine in which the key can change with each letter as it accumulates. Then that falls afoul of the “it’s simple” idea you’ve put forth.

      Reply
  91. Daylily says:

    Fred said that this is “pure cryptography.” Yet it isn’t a substitution code, one letter for another letter, because then we would have at least some nonsense words in the coded sentence. So what kind of a code uses all standard English words, alternating with numbers, to form a regular English sentence?

    Reply
  92. fsdthreshold says:

    THE SOLUTION

    This second puzzle has, alas, proven much more difficult than I supposed or intended it to be. Therefore, by general request and consensus of the regular blog membership, I am officially declaring an end to this contest. It has gone the way of Masquerade, with no solving “winner.” You were, however, (though many seem to find it hard to believe) agonizingly close!

    I noticed this pattern, too: the younger thinkers were more than once the very closest, standing right on top of the solution and poking it around with their toes! You can see for yourselves: the record of all the long labors and good ideas is there. Young and more mature, you are an admirable and astonishing group of thinkers. Since I knew that, I never expected the puzzle to be too hard. I could not out-think any of you, and would not want to try.

    There were many moments along the way when I was SURE you had it, that someone would unravel the puzzle in a matter of hours or minutes. It began when Hannah noticed right away that the words belonged to three groups. When you had “Tolkien” and “three” and the code before you, I was, as I said, quite sure someone would make the necessary connections.

    Look back to Comment #32, when Daylily said this:

    “I like your guess! It has a certain ring to it. Maybe I’ll set it to music. Rap music, I think. With accordion riffs at beginning, middle, and end!”

    I seriously wondered there if Daylily was telling us she had the answer, because she seemed to be making a play on the word “ring” and a reference to three: beginning, middle, and end — The Lord of the Rings. Was that a coincidence, Daylily?

    Morwenna, Swordlily, Shieldmaiden — you kept leading us back to “These words are divided into three groups.” There’s one group that relates to fruit, one that relates to colors, and one that relates to books.

    Hagiograph was looking for repeated units in the code which would logically indicate repeated units in the translated answer. I was agreeing with that thinking by directing your attention to “ink 3/cover 3” and “grape 16/apple 16.” Yes! Those are indeed pairs of identicals. The 3’s represent the same unit, repeated, and the 16’s represent the same unit, repeated. I allowed you to ponder that in the hope that it would firmly fix in your minds that the word and the number after it must be considered together.

    Tolkien wrote a great work which is, because of a decision made by his publisher, most often packaged for us in three books, The Lord of the Rings. You’re quite right, Shieldmaiden: it’s mistakenly referred to as a “trilogy” when it’s not. A trilogy is a group of three closely-connected books that usually share a common world and common characters, and they may tell an overarching story, but each of the books decidedly stands alone and has its own ending. Each comes to a resolution. There’s nothing like that in The Lord of the Rings. There’s no ending at the end of The Fellowship of the Ring or at the end of The Two Towers. We have to read on to reach the climax and conclusion.

    So each group of related words was meant to indicate one of the three books of LOTR. Wasn’t it Swordlily who hit upon this idea first? Bravo! (You can see why I had to keep saying, “You’re so close!”) Swordlily even talked about counting words in the three books. So very close!

    So you have a book-and-a-number, a book-and-a-number, etc. What I thought might throw you temporarily was that “grape” comes first, but I didn’t assign the fruit group to The Fellowship of the Ring. To that first book, I assigned the book-related words.

    One aspect that makes it tricky is that “grape” and “seed,” for example, are different words, but because they’re of the same group, they indicate the same book. I guess that’s what messed up some of the higher-level code-breaking approaches.

    It would have been a process of trial and error, but eventually you would have tried the book-related words as The Fellowship of the Ring, the fruit-related words as The Two Towers, and the colors as The Return of the King.

    The final step would have been realizing that the numbers indicated not words — but letters.

    As Scott rightly pointed out: in different editions, page numbers may change. But the text doesn’t change. I tried it with two different editions to be sure.

    So:

    grape (The Two Towers) 16 = “T” — the letter t is the 16th letter of that book, if you start at the beginning and work forward. You have to use the actual text of the story, not any introductory material.

    green (The Return of the King) 21 = the 21st letter of that book, “H.” (That’s “h” — it’s a little hard to see in this font.)

    And so on. Ultimately, you would have arrived at this English sentence:

    “The cow ate grass.”

    And that is the solution to the code.

    Very rudimentary and “simple,” as I said? Yes. Anyone with your mind, paper, pencil, and a copy of LOTR could have solved it, even if you’d never read the books. Were you as a group “close”? Yes! Unbearably so! The solution was not metaphorical or poetic, not a riddle. As I understand the definition, this is a simple cipher code, in which you need a key (the books), and numbers indicate letters in the books. (In fact, during the first puzzle about the keyboard letters, Joe suggested this possibility, which is partly what inspired me to put together this second one, and what led me to believe you’d solve it pretty quickly.) The pure cryptographers in the group should be satisfied, though I suspect the code was, in the end, far more basic than you were suspecting.

    “If we shadows have offended,
    Think but this, and all is mended,
    That you have but slumb’red here,
    While these visions did appear,
    And this weak and idle theme,
    No more yielding but a dream,
    Gentles, do not reprehend.
    If you pardon, we will mend.
    . . .
    Give me your hands, if we be friends,
    And Robin shall restore amends.”
    –A Midsummer Night’s Dream, V.i
    William Shakespeare

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Thank you, Hagiograph! Coming from you, those two gracious words mean a whole, whole lot to me. I really hoped that you would be satisfied with the fairness and legitimacy of this code.

      Thanks again to all for playing. I know that many of you put in hours and hours of thought. As the frustration of not quite arriving at the answer begins to recede, I hope you’ll remember the experience with a smile.

      There’s a quote from The Aeneid that I’ve always liked. It’s sometimes translated as “Someday we’ll laugh even about this,” but the version I like best is: “Someday it will even make us happy to remember these things.”

      To be perfectly clear: I don’t think for a minute that my rudimentary code “defeated” anybody. I sense that most of you were operating on a level well beyond it, and the game ran a bit long. I’m afraid my attempts to get you to “think easier” may have grated on some nerves.

      Thank you all for being here, and for being the varied, passionate, and amazing group that you are! Your support is, if possible, even more important to me right now, as I search high and low for a job and seem to be encountering a string of doors slamming shut.

      So, thank you!

      Reply
  94. Swordlily says:

    It was fun, Fred! Even though I spent a long time trying to figure out the riddle it was all good fun. I think one of the sentences me and my siblings came up with while trying to count words in the books was something like, “Hobbits party on the Aragorn.”
    We were so close, but I kept dismissing the idea that it was letters instead of words because I didn’t think the sentence could be only fourteen letters long, too bad for me ^-^

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Thank you, Swordlily! I am relieved and happy that you had fun! You were within inches of solving it! “Hobbits party on the Aragorn”! Ha, ha, ha!

      I wanted to give you this hint on the last day:
      “Let not words become your fetters;
      Set yourself to counting letters.”
      But by then, I think most people were getting annoyed with my hints and just wanted the solution.

      I had originally intended to make the answer sentence be: “The cow jumped over the moon,” but man! Tolkien doesn’t use a J until a long way in! So I had to pick a sentence that wouldn’t involve too much counting.

      The short sentence probably did make it harder overall; there were fewer patterns to recognize.

      Reply
  95. Joe M says:

    Who won the ARC copy then. And I thought of the letter thing. Pure Cypher 39 clues site basic training. Level 1. Anyhow. I don’t have copies of the books so I was up the Crick without a paddle.

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Sorry you didn’t have the books at hand, Joe. 🙁 That’s the limitation of a puzzle like this. I knew not everyone would have any given book I might have used. I thought with this audience, The Lord of the Rings was the best bet, the book most people were likely to have.

      As to the ARC, I have an idea. Please see the forthcoming post!

      Reply
  96. Shieldmaiden says:

    No worries Fred. We had fun. My favorite part was the poem clue about Tolkien. And the only part I hated was giving up, now that doesn’t even bother me because I can say that I never, ever would have solved it. Early on (even before the first clue) I noticed the groups and started looking at that pattern, I never mentioned it because it didn’t lead anywhere. Then from further clues I looked at the three groups again, and tried a BUNCH of stuff, but still couldn’t crack it. But I never would have thought to go out of order. I actually tried counting out the numbers in both The Hobbit and The Fellowship but gave up when neither book led to anything coherent. Then when the Part III thing happened I counted out The Return of the King, but again, nothing came of it. However, even had I realized it was one book per group, I would have gone in the same order of the code: fruit first, then colors, and book items last. Because of that I think I never would have tried the groups of numbers in the correct book order. And I only counted letters once, I think it was in The Hobbit (aside from the alphabet LOL) the other times I counted in LOTR it was also words, like SwordLily. This is one of those “close, but yet so far” moments. And I was far!

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Thanks, Shieldmaiden! I’m glad it was fun for you, despite the frustrations. Yes, I know riddles are your thing more than codes. I think we all need a break from both! (So you had the “three groups” idea from the very beginning! Brilliant!)

      Reply
  97. I am Mr. Brown Snowflake says:

    “The cow ate grass.” Weeks were spent trying to devine “the cow ate grass.” (pushes away from desk, shaking head in aggravation, disbelief and disapproval).
    OK, now let us get back to the ‘regular’ blog, shall we?

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Dear friend, the time was spent trying to solve a puzzle! Did you expect the meaning of life? But we already know that!

      Really, “the cow ate grass” is kind of profound. It’s pastoral, natural, peaceful, and has healing properties.

      But yes — I’m working on the latest blog post right now.

      Reply
  98. Daylily says:

    On Comment #32: I was solely referring to Hagiograph’s creative take on the code, his Shakespearian interpretation. No hidden meaning. I was nowhere close to the answer, alas.

    Alas, alas,
    The cow ate grass;
    The grape-sick teens
    Have left en masse . . .

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Ha, ha! Nice!

      Disgruntled are the folk with impish host;
      High time it is to write a different post.
      We’re sick of numbers, colors, fruits, and rings,
      And long to turn our thoughts to different things.

      Reply
  99. jhagman says:

    I guess none of us are going to get a job at Bletchley Park ,,,,but then again, they would need someone to mow their lawns, and I have had a security clearance in the past- and I do mow a very mean lawn!

    Reply
  100. Thomas Shields says:

    Wow, this was great. Unfortunately I came in a little late, and couldn’t discipline myself to really try to solve it without looking at the answers. Being rather new here, I wonder – will there be more codes? I rather hope so. I shall have to see about reading the book, too.
    – Thomas

    Reply
    • fsdthreshold says:

      Oh, wow, Thomas! We SO could have used your help on this code! 🙂 This post and the one before it were done as contests for the giving-away of advance review copies of The Star Shard. I think the general opinion of the readership is that everyone is tired of codes for a while — people really went all out trying to solve these! HOWEVER, if you really like this sort of thing, the novel I’m working on now involves a lot of them . . . as does another, finished novel which is currently seeking a publisher. So hang on, and more codes (in the contexts of stories) will hopefully be coming your way!

      In the meantime, please stick around! I’ve vowed from the outset that this will never be a “what-I-had-for-breakfast” blog. There are some stretches when I don’t post for awhile, but when I do, I try to make it count. But what really makes this space fun are the readers. Pull up a chair! Welcome, welcome!

      Reply
        • fsdthreshold says:

          Really?! 🙂 Um . . . coffee.

          Lunch was slightly more responsible: an apple and macaroni & cheese. (Notice the apple, everyone! I ate an apple!)

          Reply
          • jhagman says:

            My friends that have lived in Japan tell me that what they really miss after they have come back to the States is the pickles. They say you can’t beat Japanese pickles. I am reading “The Star Shard”,,it is superb, hopefully it will finance some trips for you to Pennsylvania’s vast food markets. Ann Hark mentions them in her books, and a friend of mine who worked in Penn told me they still exist and are amazing.

          • fsdthreshold says:

            Jhagman, I’m really happy that you’re enjoying the book! Yes, I miss Japanese pickles. I miss gyouza (meat dumplings), though they’re really Chinese, and I miss curry rice — a bowl of hot rice with a spicy curry sauce (like gravy) poured over the top of it.

  101. Buurenaar says:

    ACK. I am glad that I wasn’t in the thick of this. If I had been, no homework would have been done until I solved it. One word: Cumberland. Don’t think about it. 😉

    Reply
      • Buurenaar says:

        I feel special now…if not full of hot air. I’ve been working on a little something off and on for a little while. Let it be shown on the record that creating a new language from grammar up is a royal pain in the derriere.

        Reply

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