Phi has a theme running through today’s puzzle.

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A rather difficult but enjoyable and so far as I can see utterly sound crossword from Tees (except perhaps for 1dn, about which I shall no doubt be corrected). He has achieved a rather odd feat, which I shall mention in a moment; the other feat which he almost achieved (if indeed he was even trying to achieve it) was to have no anagrams in the crossword. This failed and he had to use them in two clues, but only two I think.

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Last Wednesday we had a special May Day offering from Donk but we are now back to normal with a lovely puzzle from Dac

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Tuesday today, so you take pot luck in terms of the setter. Today offered me a rare opportunity to blog a puzzle by Jambazi.

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Klingsor starts the week, he seems to have gone for a &lit record attempt it felt like today.

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A pleasing puzzle from Hypnos in the usual IoS style – not too challenging, but with plenty of good clues to enjoy.  This one fell out nicely – it was a solver-friendly grid and there were no particular obscurities (well, maybe one …)

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As expected, this was a somewhat challenging Saturday puzzle from Nimrod. Several of the clues were deceptively straightforward, but there were quite a few that were fiendishly constructed, really stirring up the grey matter! There was a bit of a theme affecting six answers, but we’re not aware of any particular event that this might relate to.

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It isn’t giving anything away to the casual reader of this blog to say that all the across clues are of two words. I found it rather hard to get started on this, but from the blogger’s point of view the task is easier because there are so few clues to explain. By the end of it I was wondering why I’d had so much trouble, because as usual everything is efficient and quite transparent (except perhaps for 2dn). Read the rest of this entry »

A lovely offering from Nestor today with nothing to complain about!

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It is Wednesday today, and yet we are not crossing swords with either Dac or Crosophile? How can this be? Have I slept right through Wednesday and missed my blogging slot altogether?

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Alchemi is one of the newer setters on the Independent block.  This was a pleasant solve without too many pitfalls.

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Lots of neat, well-written clues as ever from Quixote. I particularly liked the &lit of 6 and and the apposite surface reading of 22.
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I believe this is only the second IoS from Commoner.  Many interesting surfaces.  The last answer that I parsed took a bit longer than the others.  Thanks to Commoner.  Definitions are underlined in the clues.  [[The pictures at the bottom have unidentified links to the puzzle. Please enclose any comments on them in double brackets. Thank you.]]

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A challenging puzzle, as one tends to expect from a Bannsider, but I got there. It took almost the entire week, but I did manage to finish unaided, though one or two took a little longer to understand even once the answer was clear.

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Another Friday Phi puzzle to blog – we’re not complaining!

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