The perfect way to keep your kids off screens

Jeff Northam’s puzzle books will keep your kids entertained, but don’t be surprised if you get addicted.

Jeff Northam, the artist behind Braindrops

How does a person feel upon being abducted by a spaceship?

Alienated!

Yes, it’s a great kids joke, and it’s exactly the kind of smart word puzzle you can expect to find in Jeff Northam’s annual bumper puzzle book, Braindrops (cartoon puzzles for a brainy day, get it?)

Long-time readers will know Northam as the artist behind the weekly puzzle in Review, and he also designs our pages in his capacity as The Australian’s deputy production editor.

Every Christmas recently he’s been producing a Braindrops puzzle book for the whole family (including the young and young at heart, because who doesn’t like a puzzle?).

This year he releases the third instalment featuring 130 of his original, colourful puzzles

“When I was younger, I loved writing and I loved drawing,” he says. “So, I had two paths I could have gone down, but I thought writing is probably better for a career and drawing is probably better as a hobby. I ended up becoming a journalist and following that career, but ironically, I guess, I ended up on the artistic side of journalism by designing pages.

“Twenty-four years ago, I was given a kids’ page to design for a newspaper I was working on, and they didn’t give me any content. So I thought, OK, I’ll fill it out with one of my drawings. But you can’t just dump a drawing in the middle of a page, so I turned it into an Easter puzzle of an Easter bunny coming out of an egg, and then you had to put the pieces of the egg back together.

“Suddenly, I had a real focus for the cartoons I’d been drawing ever since I was old enough to hold a pencil – turning them into puzzles.”

The target audience for Northam’s books is 10 years and over, and he hopes they offer an alternative to the omnipresent screens. “I got a real sense that parents and grandparents were buying the puzzle books last year because they wanted their kids not to be glued to screens,” he says.

“Puzzles use a different part of the brain.”

His own daughter is 22 “so she just missed out on having screens when she was younger”.

“We spent a lot of time at the park, playing outside,” he says. “I do despair about young kids now just having screens at such an early age, and I do hope my puzzle books provide some kind of an alternative that parents can give to their kids.”

Northam draws the old-fashioned way, on a piece of paper, before scanning the drawing into a computer. He uses Photoshop to add colours and text.

Can you solve this puzzle?

His latest book features The Puzzler, an elusive character, hidden throughout his puzzles which the reader must find, adding another layer to the book.

Northam says his puzzles range in difficulty and says some are a bit hard especially for younger kids but he doesn’t want to dumb down his work.

“If they were too easy there would be no challenge and if there’s no challenge there’s no sense of achievement. I like the fact some are a bit tricky. Sometimes I go back to an old puzzle to put into a new book and I have trouble solving it and I created it!”

Having said that though, he is working on a book for a younger demographic.

“I’ve just started a book for kids under 10 which features mostly picture oriented puzzles. I’m going to call the book Droplets: Braindrops for Younger Minds. It will be out next year”

Northam’s favourite puzzles are the “find the object” ones, or the word puzzles with two meanings (so, “turn the handle to move air” is wind or wind, and “to be sad aboard a two-wheeled vehicle” is moped on a moped.)

His favourite characters to draw are aliens, “because they give you a real freedom to draw crazy creatures. I also like big noses, and bulbous eyes, because you can get so much expression into a face when you have big eyes.”

Northam also gets a kick out of hosting cartoon classes, such as the one he recently ran for the John Hunter Hospital in Newcastle. “Just seeing what the kids come up with based upon my direction is such a thrill,” he says.

“The drawings are always a little different and sometimes better.”

Northam has his books printed locally and sells them for $17.99, and they look gorgeous. They are a proper gift for a smart kid in your family or even for adults wanting to test their mental agility. Obviously, we recommend them to you.

Braindrops books are available at https://www.braindrop.com.au and are also on sale at Better Read than Dead bookshop in Sydney’s Newtown and Newcastle’s Betty Loves Books.