brief vs puzzle

brief

noun
  • A writ summoning one to answer; an official letter or mandate. 

  • An answer to any action. 

  • A position of interest or advocacy. 

  • An attorney's legal argument in written form for submission to a court. 

  • A short news story or report. 

  • A memorandum of points of fact or of law for use in conducting a case. 

  • The material relevant to a case, delivered by a solicitor to the barrister who is counsel for the case. 

  • A ticket of any type. 

  • A letter patent, from proper authority, authorizing a collection or charitable contribution of money in churches, for any public or private purpose. 

  • A barrister who is counsel for a party in a legal action. 

  • underwear briefs. 

adj
  • Of short duration; happening quickly. 

  • Concise; taking few words. 

  • Occupying a small distance, area or spatial extent; short. 

verb
  • To summarize a recent development to some person with decision-making power. 

  • To write a legal argument and submit it to a court. 

puzzle

noun
  • A riddle. 

  • Anything that is difficult to understand or make sense of. 

  • The state of being puzzled; perplexity. 

  • A game for one or more people that is more or less difficult to work out or complete. 

  • A jigsaw puzzle. 

  • A crossword puzzle. 

verb
  • To think long and carefully, in bewilderment. 

  • To perplex, confuse, or mystify; to cause (someone) to be faced with a mystery, without answers or an explanation. 

  • To make intricate; to entangle. 

How often have the words brief and puzzle occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )