18
$\begingroup$

Detective Jezerezeh has found a table of suspicious words:

list

teeth

actions

grammar

saying

information

engage

ballad

terror

Alabama

exam

What's so suspicious about them?

Hint 1:

I will either add more words or more hints if this isn't solved soon.

Improve this question
$\endgroup$
4
  • 1
    $\begingroup$ It would be much appreciated, if you could wait about 24h before adding hints, we have people in many time zones, so it would be nice if everyone got an equal chance. $\endgroup$
    – Bass
    Commented Jan 6, 2019 at 3:42
  • $\begingroup$ @Bass "Soon" is relative. 1 billion years could be soon in the grand scheme of things given the timescale of the universe. Oddly enough, I was going to say 24 hours, but decided against giving an exact time because I might forget to get back on this website anywhere around this time tomorrow. $\endgroup$
    – Display name
    Commented Jan 6, 2019 at 3:45
  • 1
    $\begingroup$ @Displayname if more than one rule works (see El-Guest 's answer), the question may be too broad. I recommend you to add more "suspicious words" to narrow down the possibilities. Or are these the only possibilities? Thanks! $\endgroup$
    – Omega Krypton
    Commented Jan 6, 2019 at 11:48
  • $\begingroup$ any update on extra words/hints? $\endgroup$
    – 1848
    Commented Jan 8, 2019 at 4:00

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
9
$\begingroup$

Could it be that there

Are other words hiding inside the suspicious words?

Namely,

list
teeth
actions
grammar
saying
information
engage

Even with the additions, we see that we have

ballad
terror

And with even more additions...

Alabama
exam

Improve this answer
$\endgroup$
3
  • $\begingroup$ No, but this deserves an upvote because it's quite a coincidence that this works. $\endgroup$
    – Display name
    Commented Jan 6, 2019 at 3:14
  • 1
    $\begingroup$ Could you add a word which doesn’t match my pattern, @Displayname ? None of the words do that so far. $\endgroup$
    – El-Guest
    Commented Jan 6, 2019 at 17:43
  • 1
    $\begingroup$ And the other additions also fit this pattern! :-) Then again, every single word in this comment fits too. $\endgroup$
    – deep thought
    Commented Jan 9, 2019 at 2:57
6
$\begingroup$

Preliminary guess

Three of them are near-palindromes: teet(h), (g)rammar, e(n)gage.

Also (and this was my hint),

(J)ezereze(h). And -- a bit more of a stretch -- su(sp)ici(o)us itself.

But that doesn't explain

list, actions, saying, information. They seem to be ... speech-related ???

[OP added words while I was writing this]:

(b)alla(d), which fits. Terror... uhm. :-)

[More additions]:

A(l)aba(m)a, yes. Exam... another miss. (I wonder if 'Detective' is also a miss, just as Jezerezeh fits.)

Improve this answer
$\endgroup$
2
  • 1
    $\begingroup$ Not quite. However, rot13(gur snpg gung guerr bs gurz ner arne-cnyvaqebzrf vf abg n pbvapvqrapr). Also, you caught that earlier than usual. Perhaps "I will add more hints" tipped you off to the fact that there already was a hint. $\endgroup$
    – Display name
    Commented Jan 6, 2019 at 3:19
  • 3
    $\begingroup$ That's a good find! Of the ones that don't fit, many have synonyms that fit: actions, saying, info, terror, exam. $\endgroup$
    – M Oehm
    Commented Jan 9, 2019 at 9:43

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge you have read our privacy policy.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.