Independent 7,966 / Nestor
Posted by RatkojaRiku on 26th April 2012
My Thursday slot often presents me with a puzzle by Nestor and today was one such day.
Posted in Independent | 7 Comments »
Archive for April, 2012
Financial Times 13,979 – Falcon
Posted by Sil van den Hoek on 26th April 2012
Monday Prize Crossword/Apr 16
Quite a surprise to see a Falcon crossword on a Monday (instead of the expected Dante who, for once, took the Tuesday spot that week), but this neatly clued puzzle was certainly very welcome. Some fine cluing from the FT’s Everyman – not very hard, but elegant and effortless as ever [which I consider to be something positive].
Posted in FT | 2 Comments »
Financial Times 13,978 by Cinephile
Posted by Pete Maclean on 26th April 2012
Posted in FT | No Comments »
Financial Times 13,987 by Cinephile
Posted by PeeDee on 25th April 2012
A pretty straightforward puzzle today, very enjoyable nonetheless. Thank you Cinephile.
Posted in FT | 2 Comments »
Independent 7965 / Crosophile
Posted by duncanshiell on 25th April 2012
This looks like a fairly standard crossword from Crosophile. The clues are not too difficult, the wordplay is not too complex and the vocabulary of the entries comprises words I would expect to find in Independent news articles and features.
Posted in Independent | 19 Comments »
Inquisitor 1225: One Down by Schadenfreude
Posted by duncanshiell on 25th April 2012
This puzzle had quite a long preamble, as follows: ‘Initially the filled grid will contain seven consecutive empty cells. One letter must be removed from the answers to 20 clues and the residue used to form a word or proper nouns for grid entry, in seven cases without rearrangement. The removed letters provide an instruction. All entries in the final grid are real words or names or phrases, including a well-known brand name. Those experiencing difficulty may be rescued by 21 down’.
Posted in Inquisitor | 5 Comments »
Guardian 25,619 – Gordius
Posted by Andrew on 25th April 2012
Another rather horrible grid, with four semi-isolated quadrants. There were a couple of these last week, where the setters had helpfully split some answers around the quadrants. No such luck here, but instead there are quite a lot of very obvious clues that wouldn’t be out of place in the Quiptic.
Posted in Guardian | 23 Comments »
Independent 7964/Anax
Posted by John on 24th April 2012
A quite excellent crossword from Anax. He seems to be a frequent contributor to the Independent (or perhaps it’s just that he always seems to get me) and although his crosswords are on the hard side, something a blogger is not always all that enthusiastic about, they are unfailingly high-quality and always enjoyable.
Posted in Independent | 15 Comments »
Financial Times 13986 Armonie
Posted by scchua on 24th April 2012
A first pass got me worried, until I got a foothold in the SE corner, and things then went okay. Thanks Armonie for an enjoyable puzzle, perhaps a little harder than usual. Definitions are underlined in the clues. Each of the pictures at the bottom has an unidentified link to the crossword – hint: there are 3 pairs of pictures, and 1 setter’s device.
Posted in FT | No Comments »
Guardian 25618 – Paul
Posted by Uncle Yap on 24th April 2012
I really enjoyed myself this morning . This has got to be one of the best Paul puzzles … there is sex, there is religion, there is intrigue and there is royalty. Did you hear about the short story contest won by a college student? The rules specified that all the above elements must be present. The winning entry “Jesus Christ! The queen is pregnant and she doesn’t know who the father is” Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Guardian | 37 Comments »
Independent 7963 by Mordred
Posted by nmsindy on 23rd April 2012
A puzzle which I enjoyed, solving time 32 mins. I found the top half very easy but the bottom half far more difficult.
Posted in Independent | 11 Comments »
Guardian 25,617 – Orlando
Posted by manehi on 23rd April 2012
Excellent, challenging puzzle from Orlando today. Favourites were 13ac, 24ac and 20dn.
Posted in Guardian | 30 Comments »
Guardian Quiptic N° 649 by Pan
Posted by PeterO on 23rd April 2012
I found this slow going at first, because of the lack of answers which leapt out at me, but it came out handily in the end. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Guardian Quiptic | 3 Comments »
IoS 1,156/Radian
Posted by Ali on 22nd April 2012
This was a tour de force from Radian, with about as much thematic material as you could hope for. Having solved the puzzle mid-week, the significance of the date of publication was lost on me and it took me quite a while to work out that the ‘it’ referenced in a lot of the clues was The Titanic. Having got that, this was still a tricky solve, but I very much enjoyed the inter-connected anagrams and wealth of nautical references in the clues. Excellent stuff. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Independent | 5 Comments »
Azed 2,080
Posted by bridgesong on 22nd April 2012
An unusual grid construction in this week’s Azed gave us rather more 4-letter words than usual, as well as the usual quotient of obsolete, foreign (particularly French) and downright obscure words. The 4-letter words are often the most difficult; I initially had TOLL at 11 across, and TOSE held me up for some time. The only clue where the wordplay has entirely defeated me is at 29 across. I’ve set out a couple of other quibbles in the text. Here’s a link to the pdf of the puzzle. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in Azed | 10 Comments »