Book Review: Bend Your Brain

I'd been meaning to post this review for awhile, but after my laptop conked out I forgot. Lol I requested a free copy of this book from a site I am a member of called Blogging for Books in exchange for an honest review.

 

 

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What is it?

Bend Your Brain is the result of a collective effort by several puzzlers that combines visual perception, retention, critical thinking and coordination skills in a variety of 100+ puzzles meant to challenge and help strengthen the brain. Now I love brain challenges. I'm not often good at them lol, but I enjoy them nonetheless. I've been using a couple of daily brain training apps and they've both been a lot of fun for me, so when I joined Blogging for Books a few months ago and came across this book, I requested it immediately. I assumed I'd sail right through it, might have a few tough puzzles but otherwise figured it'd be pretty easy. Oh, ye of too much faith in oneself. LOL I horribly underestimated the level of difficulty of the book, and overestimated my brain power to the same degree. I wouldn't classify the majority of these exercises as being easy. Fun, yes. Maybe even a little frustrating, lol, and I have no shame in admitting that I felt like quite the fool after being unable to complete a few puzzles that I had previously underestimated as being easy.

 

 

What I liked about this book was how many different puzzles there were. I've learned through the different brain challenge apps that I have been using lately that there are so many ways to challenge your brain and its power. I still somehow wondered how 100+ puzzles in one book was somehow going to be educational, fun, challenging, and still hit different areas of the brain. This book accomplishes all four things. I also liked that the different parts of the book were categorized according to the skill that would be tested, which I think helps a lot if one is trying to strengthen a certain part of the mind. I liked that other ideas were given at the back of the book four different activities that strengthen the brain. Although many of the challenges in the book would not be suitable for younger children, like the trivia questions, these suggestions at the back of the book would be good options for parents trying to integrate some education into their child's games. It was helpful to include what skills each suggestion would test as well.

 

 

If I had a complaint with the book, I'd say to make the challenges easier, but that's frustration talking. Lol I'm really enjoying this book and have no complaints. Even the size and weight of the book are unimposing; I can easily drop this into my purse or laptop bag and for a book that said it had 100+ challenges, I was expecting something larger. I thought that the instructions for each puzzle were easy to understand, the light tone of the book fit right in with the puzzles, and the puzzles themselves were designed in a way that made the experience fun and educational, not boring.

 

 

Do I recommend this book?

 Not if you're in the market for something easy. I do recommend the book if you're in the mood for something challenging, you're a whiz at puzzles, or want something different to do in your free time. For my first experience with Blogging for Books, this was a pretty cool introduction. When my laptop is fixed, I'll update the post with some peeks at the challenges so you can see if this book is something you'd like. See you all soon!

 

 

My Rating:

 

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Still here!

I just wanted to do an update really quick and let you know that I'm still alive, lol, I know I went ghost after my last post (rhyme alert lol) and that wasn't originally the intention, but as I have come to realize, my intentions don't matter bc shit happens. Lol and that's exactly what happened shortly after putting RRNT on a short hiatus so I could get caught up. I'd published the post then gotten to work, finishing the new header, finalizing one of the icons and finally coming up with a posting schedule that integrated both this and the vintage blog, then shit happened.

And now its time for Storytime with Mandy:Broke Dick Laptop Edition. It broke down the night before I was going to implement my schedule, and what I initially thought to be a CPU problem ended up actually being the motherboard, so obviously I have to get a replacement laptop. Since I'm no longer in school, I don't receive the stipends I used to get, which is how I got my other laptops. The laptop that just crapped out was a backup laptop as my primary computer went belly up with hard disk failure last summer, shortly before I finished school. My final stipend from school was used almost completely on paying for my trip to Arizona for graduation, so I wasn't able to get it fixed. I'd been given a replacement by that time and I was also relying on being able to go back to school later, and because of that I didn't think much about repairing the primary right away. That was my bad, because now I can no longer re-enroll so there are no more stipends to fall back on. Which means that my primary laptop is now broke dick indefinitely. With the backup now being broke dick as well, I'm all the way up the creek with a hole in the middle of the boat and a Popsicle stick to keep me company. Lol I've looked at some repair prices for the primary and we're looking anywhere from between $70 to $140, if not more. Since I can't afford that at the moment, I have all the potential of the Titanic at making it to shore. lol Did I mention that I can't swim? And that concludes the latest chapter of Storytime with Mandy: Broke Dick Laptop Edition.

Its very frustrating and discouraging bc it feels like there are 10 million obstacles in my way. Money rules the world and not only do I not have any, I'm not in a position to make any. Financially, this year has been crazy tough on me and this is just the latest addition to the past 10 months of constant fuckery that's been going on in my life. I'm a review blogger and trying my hardest to pursue this seriously because its one of the few things that makes me happy. But I swear, its been one thing after the other. If not money, its cable. If not cable, then my laptop. Neither of those things would be as much of a problem if there was more $. See how it all comes full circle? Lol That's just the tip of the iceberg though, if I'm being completely honest, my life, in every way, is a shitstorm. Which is why i try so hard to keep the few things that make me happy. But moving on, this lovely post is being done on my phone, and i would like to include a small sidenote on my hatred for AutoCorrect and touchscreen keyboards at this time. I have still been reviewing while I've been in blogger timeout though, and I now have a notebook full of posts ready to get typed out when I can get back to a computer. I have a new addition to the TV portion of the site that I thought of during my satellite sabbatical, and I can't wait to implement it. I'm two months behind in my SBS posts, so I'm going to try to get to the library soon so I can at least get those up.

Until then though, just hang in there with me for a little while longer. I'm sorry I have to keep doing this. I'm also sorry that our chit chats always seem to have a negative undertone to them, that's not my intention either. See the beginning of this post for my thoughts on intentions and we will have officially done a 360 on this post. Lol I don't mean to complain, I really don't. I haven't fully explained whats going on in my life and don't know whether or not I will, but despite everything that's going on I know full well I could have worse. I have had worse and I'm super grateful that I'm not experiencing a lot of that stuff anymore. I've just always been of the belief that when you're at the bottom, the only other way to go is back up and that's where I'm fighting to get. Unfortunately, right now fate disagrees LOL and my hands are tied, so I get frustrated. But anyway, I hope you're having a wonderful weekend and I'll hopefully be seeing you again soon! Do you have any Halloweenie costumes in mind yet? Let me know!

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