Little Turing Press

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Bit locked this message. Can you unlock it?

The Little Turing Codebreakers & The Glitching Robot

A crown vanishes from a locked vault. Robots go wild at the science fair. A skyscraper races towards a midnight blackout. Kids aged 8–11 crack 24 puzzles to find out who did it, using real computer science and just a pencil.

Buy the paperback on Amazon Get the free starter pack

In Germany or Europe? Buy on Amazon.de · Amazon.co.uk

Book cover: Bit the robot holding a magnifying glass, with Leo and Poppy, above the London skyline at night.

How a case works

Every case has four suspects and eight puzzles. Only one suspect is guilty. Your child is the detective.

  1. Read the case file

    Study the map, meet the suspects and listen to what each one says.

  2. Crack a puzzle

    Bit the robot explains one computer-science idea, with an example. Then it's your turn.

  3. Open the Evidence Locker

    The answer is the name of a drawer. Inside is a clue. Wrong answers open decoy drawers!

  4. Name the culprit

    Cross out suspects until only one is left. Then fill in the case board.

Three cases

Each case gets a little harder. Case 1 is gentle. Case 3 is a real challenge.

Inside the book, the pictures are black and white, ready for pencils.

Leo, Poppy and Bit at the empty display case in a museum vault.

The Clockwork Crown Heist

The lights go out at a museum gala for 90 seconds. When they come back on, the Gear-Crown is gone.

Binary, Caesar cipher, logic gates, IF/ELSE, shortest paths

Robots going wild in a school gym while Poppy finds a note by the router.

The Sabotaged Science Fair

Someone plugged a sneaky USB stick into the school router. Now the robots are out of control.

Pigpen cipher, bubble sort, ASCII, coordinates, hexadecimal, loops

Leo plugs Bit into a control desk at the top of a dark skyscraper.

The Smart-Tower Blackout

London's greenest skyscraper locks itself down. At midnight, all 64 floors go dark.

Binary search, stacks, parity bits, run-length encoding, sequences

Meet the Codebreakers

Leo, a boy with glasses and a yellow hoodie, holding a notebook.

Leo Turing, 10

The pattern spotter. He breaks big problems into small steps and never skips his working.

Poppy, a girl with goggles and an orange scarf, holding a torch and a cipher wheel.

Poppy Chen, 9

The code cracker. She reads secret messages faster than most people read a menu.

Bit, a small blue robot with a screen for a face.

Bit

A pocket robot, brilliant at maths, but static makes it glitch. Always check what Bit says!

Bit the robot popping out of a filing drawer full of papers.

Free Codebreaker Starter Pack

Four new puzzles to print at home or in class, with an answer page. Not in the book, so it's a perfect try-before-you-buy.

  • Unlock Bit's secret welcome message
  • Read a name tag written in binary
  • Decode Poppy's pigpen note
  • Solve a mini logic puzzle
Download the starter pack (PDF, 2 pages)

For parents and teachers

Real computer-science ideas, taught through stories. Children solve short puzzles, then use the answers to rule out suspects. No device needed.

What children practise

  • Binary and hexadecimal
  • Caesar and pigpen ciphers
  • Logic gates
  • IF / ELSE decisions
  • Loops
  • Sorting and searching
  • Stacks
  • Parity bits
  • Coordinates
  • Checking AI answers
  • Logic grids
  • Number patterns

The details

  • Ages8 to 11
  • FormatPaperback, 100 pages, 6 × 9 in
  • You needA pencil and an eraser
  • Time per caseAbout 60 to 90 minutes
  • Help built inA hint for every puzzle, plus a full answer key
  • Extras24 warm-ups, a glossary, bonus puzzles and a diploma

Why I wrote this book

I'm a software engineer and a dad. At home, my favourite job is making puzzles for my 8-year-old son. He always asked for "just one more!", and those puzzles became this book. I want children to discover that computer science is not only about screens. It's about thinking clearly, asking good questions, and having fun with a pencil and paper.

Chinar Kakutsey · chinarkakutsey.com