The Brits went bonkers. Other newspapers quickly realized that they, too, had to provide sudoku to stay competitive.
And that computer program is about to make him a millionaire, says Gould, who now provides free puzzles to 120 newspapers in 36 countries. Other syndicates provide their own sudoku -- Kansas City-based Universal Press and others supply dozens of US newspapers with a daily dose.
The Los Angeles Times started running the puzzles in June. The response was immediate, says Sherry Stern, deputy features editor. ``It's just something that's captured people,'' she said. ``I can't explain it.''
American book publishers saw what was happening in England earlier this year and sensed a big business opportunity.
``There were books on the best seller list there. That was unheard of, to have a puzzle book up on the best seller list,'' said John Mark Boling, a spokesman for Woodstock, New York-based Overlook Press, which quickly obtained the rights to publish some British sudoku books in the US. ``We beat everyone to the punch, basically.''
In July, the first printing of The Book of Sudoku, by Michael Mepham, sold out in two weeks. Three more sudoku books quickly followed, selling a combined 400,000 copies, Boling said.
The Book of Sudoku is also one of two sudoku books on Publishers Weekly's list, at numbers 14 and 15, respectively.
``Our orders go up hourly,'' Boling said. ``We've really been at a rush to keep up with the demand.''
At least three more US publishers quickly put out their own sudoku books.
``This is a major league best seller,'' said St. Martin's Friedman.
New York-based Barnes and Noble, the nation's largest bookseller, bought 28,000 sudoku books from Newmarket Press, according to company president Esther Margolis.
``It could flame out but based on everything I've been able to discern so far, sudoku is a keeper,'' Margolis said. ``It's the kind of puzzle that seems to be so intriguing and satisfies such a wide age range.''
Shortz, who has been addicted to sudoku since April, says their appeal is simple.
``Most problems we face in everyday life don't have perfect solutions. It's satisfying to take a problem through to the end all by yourself,'' he said.
The instructions are short, just one sentence, which Shortz said is ``very rare in puzzles.''
``It's a tremendous amount of payoff for just the tiny work of understanding what's going on,'' he said. It's also the perfect size, always nine squares by nine squares. ``It's small, but it packs a lot of puzzle in there.''
Shortz -- and Gould -- believe sudoku is here to stay.
``It will fade but I don't expect it to disappear for good,'' Gould said. ``I think the crossword and the sudoku will sit side by side for years to come. The crossword is there for the wordsmith and the sudoku is there for the rest of us.''
Today on p17 we begin publication of our own sudoku puzzles, for your enjoyment seven days a week.
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