Financial Times 13,507 – Falcon
Monday Prize Crossword on 4 October 2010 Not the usual week-opening breeze this time since Falcon had a couple of hard-boiled eggs which I could not fully understand without help from my occasional … Read more >>
Financial Times 13,506 by Cinephile
Prize puzzle from the Weekend FT of October 2 This is the best Cinephile I remember in a while. The theme is one there is little you have to figure out about; perhaps … Read more >>
Financial Times 13,515 / Cinephile
A rather tricky themed puzzle from Cinephile today with some obscure answers, in particular two place names though fortunately these were clued with easy wordplay. Definitely not one for beginners or those without … Read more >>
Independent 7486 – Dac
Delighted to make an occasional report on a weekday Indie, and to tackle a Dac puzzle well up to the usual standard. It’s not difficult but there’s lots to like. Obviously there’s the … Read more >>
Guardian 25.140 – Crucible
I found this quite hard (as was yesterday’s Brummie), but there were some easy long anagrams to get started with, and some very nice clues, with 20dn being my favourite, closely followed by … Read more >>
Inquisitor 1146: Grub Up by Lato
Inquisitor 1146 Another fairly complex preamble. In essence it says that twelve entries are not clued in the conventional way. Four of them are clued by single extra words in four clues. Further, … Read more >>
Independent 7485/Scorpion
I always fear crosswords by Scorpion, expecting them to be impossibly hard. However, this one was perfectly all right, several nice clues, one I didn’t and still don’t understand, but that’s only usual. To … Read more >>
Financial Times 13,514 / Alberich
This was a challenge for me: more difficult than the usual Tuesday FT fare. However, Alberich has rewarded our efforts with a very clever puzzle. Particularly nice were several clues in which … … Read more >>
Guardian 25139 – One-Eyed Brummie
One of the events I look forward to every fortnight is the appearance of the latest Private Eye puzzle with its irreverent, risque and outrageous clues. Today, as Brummie, this compiler included some … Read more >>
Derek Arthur (aka Viking) RIP
I have received the following unfortunate news from Derek’s son, Michael: “I have some sad news, my dad, Derek Arthur, aka Viking passed away from a pulmonary embolism on Saturday. It was very … Read more >>
Beelzebub 1,076 (03/10/10)
Almost caught up with these now. This was a nice, tough one including lots of hard words that were satisfyingly solveable from wordplay. *=anag, []=dropped, <=reversed, hom=homophone, cd=cryptic definition, dd=double definition. Across 1 … Read more >>
Independent 7484 by Mordred
Quite a tough and enjoyable puzzle from Mordred, some quite easy clues to start with but then it got much harder with the lower half of the grid especially quite difficult. Solving time, … Read more >>
Guardian 25,138 / Rufus
Morning all. This was largely very straightforward, but took us quite a while as we’re never really on Rufus’ wavelength. Still, there were some enjoyable flashes here, 10ac and 8dn being our picks. … Read more >>
Guardian Quiptic 569, by Arachne
I found the bottom half of this puzzle went smoothly, but the top half was more challenging. Most of the clues are of exemplary Ximenean form, with clear dictionary definitions; the relatively few … Read more >>
Private Eye 427 – Super sniper
If there is a theme to this crossword it is that several clues refer to the male member, some in ways that I, as a sensitive soul, find difficult to contemplate. Jacqui Smith … Read more >>