Aaron's Puzzle Palace

Thinking about Puzzles

ACME "Have You Tried...." guide

Puzzle Hunts

Puzzle Hunt Calendar - Upcoming puzzle hunt events
Huge List of Puzzle Hunts - Not all of the links work
Puzzle Hunts for Beginners - Puzzle hunts on the easy side of things for people getting into the hobby.

Puzzles I Wrote or Helped Write

Watership Down by Aaron Fuegi and Susan Glass. Written for the 2022 MIT Mystery Hunt. The solution is linked from the web page.
Funny Face by Susan Glass, Aaron Fuegi, Joe Cabrera, Matt Cleinman, and Aaron Feldman. I have reordered the names from the current solution page as Susan did at least 90% of the work on this one with the rest of us having minor contributions. Written for the 2022 MIT Mystery Hunt. The solution is linked from the web page.
Say Cheese and Smile for the Camera by Susan Glass and Aaron Fuegi. Written in 2023 for Alan Frank's annual treasure hunt; the theme was Cheese this year. The final answer is a word or phrase cluing a place or object in the house. The solution is also available. This puzzle was the first grid puzzle we have ever done and breaks some NYT rules.
Flying Under the Influence by Susan Glass and Aaron Fuegi. Written in 2022 for Alan Frank's annual treasure hunt; the theme was Chinese Zodiac this year. The final answer is a word or phrase cluing a place or object in the house. The solution is also available.
Gnomes of Zurich by Susan Glass and Aaron Fuegi. Written in 2021 for Alan Frank's annual treasure hunt; the theme was Countries this year. The final answer is a word or phrase cluing something that could be found in Alan's house. The solution is also available.
Central Park Dragon Census by Susan Glass and Aaron Fuegi. Written in 2020 for Alan Frank's annual treasure hunt. The final answer is a word or phrase. Note that the first 4x4 box of the first part of the puzzle requires a bit of local (specifically Arlington, MA and Somerville, MA) knowledge but you should be able to work around that with no problem. The solution is also available.
Our Present Situation - puzzle hunt written for the wedding of Ange Strom-Weber and Jen McTeague on April 13, 2019 by 8 members of Mystery Hunt team Palindrome. Susan Glass and I wrote "Sweet-Heart Deal". The solutions are also available.
Love Connection by Susan Glass and Aaron Fuegi. Written in 2019 for Alan Frank's annual treasure hunt. The final answer is a word or phrase. The solution is also available.
Amherst College - Application For Interdisciplinary Major Program by Susan Glass and Aaron Fuegi. Written in 2018 for Alan Frank's annual treasure hunt. The final answer is a description of a place in Alan's house. Originally intended for teams of about 8 people. The solution is also available as well as three hints of increasing helpfulness (Hint 1, Hint 2, and Hint 3). Feel free to use Hints 1 and 2; the third Hint is a quite strong hint for the main Aha.
From fairest creatures we desire increase by Susan Glass and Aaron Fuegi. Written in 2016 for Alan Frank's annual treasure hunt. The final answer is a title. Originally intended for teams of about 8 people with no internet but should be quite doable by a single person, with some internet help. The solution is also available
That'll Tichu to Mess With Us - Written for the 2008 MIT Mystery Hunt. Really an activity rather than a puzzle, however.
Jenny's FUNeral: The Laugh of Jenny (PDF) by Susan Glass and Aaron Fuegi; small 3 part puzzle extravaganza based on music, beer, and theater.
"The Cards Know All" by Aaron D. Fuegi
"Quint's Travel Agency" (PDF) by Aaron D. Fuegi

Puzzle Solvers

Sites with lots of Puzzles

National Puzzlers' League
MIT IAP Mystery Hunt - annual hunt with lots of VERY difficult puzzles. All the puzzles and solutions from recent years are online. Here is an index of puzzles.
The Grey Labyrinth - Puzzles, Discussions, Links, etc...
World Puzzle Championship puzzles and information
Microsoft College Puzzle Challenge

General Puzzle Resources

MIT Hunt Resources for Beginners (and experienced solvers too)
Puzzazz How to Solve Codes Lots of data on codes, state info, Zodiac, and a bunch of other things.
Puzzle Tools links at Microsoft College Puzzle Challenge
Google - best general search site available.
TinEye Reverse Image Search or drag an image onto the Google Image search page.

Word Puzzle Resources

QAT - Find a word matching a given pattern. Incredibly versatile.
Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary
Internet Anagram Server - nice, fast, powerful anagramming engine or Andy's Anagram Solver
Crossword Puzzle help - must know length of output word needed. Alternative is Crossword Solver
NPL Dictionary Search - also includes link to online Word Lists
Guide to Solving Cryptic Crosswords
Nutrimatic - Similar to QAT, uses standard Regex notation. Based on data mined from Wikipedia so more proper names and longer strings in database.
One Look - Dictionary search, good for compound words.
Mystery Hunter's Word Search - Supports lots of dictionaries, regular expressions, and various other tools - multiword anagrams, cryptograms, letterbanks,...
Crosswordsolver.com - Tools for solving crosswords and anagrams and for helping play Scrabble or Words with Friends.
Unscramblerer.com - Word patterns, Anagrams, Scrabble score calculator, and some other tools.