Guardian 29,472 – Anto

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Some nice clues here – I liked the appropriate anagram in 9a – but also some niggles, as noted below. Thanks to Anto for the puzzle.   Across 1 BED HOPPER Spooner’s accused … Read more >>

Financial Times 17,826 by NEO

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After breezing through half this puzzle, I needed to engage with a bit more attention to work out the other half, with Neo offering several truly ingenious clues, with quite a few witty surfaces.

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Azed 2722

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A long answer at 1 across can be helpful in getting into a puzzle, but in this case I needed a lot of crossing letters to work it out. Apart from that it … Read more >>

Everyman 4,061/18 August

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Another pleasing and sound cryptic from Everyman. Abbreviations cd cryptic definition dd double definition cad clue as definition (xxxx)* anagram anagrind = anagram indicator [x] letter(s) removed definitions are underlined Across 1 When … Read more >>

Quick Cryptic 21 by Carpathian

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This is the twenty-first Guardian Quick Cryptic, a series of 11 x 11 crosswords designed to support beginners learning cryptic crosswords.  The whole point of these crosswords is support and encouragement of new solvers, so special rules for these crosswords apply – see here.  The puzzle can be found here.

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Private Eye (Cyclops/785) Absymal Setback

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I’m suffering weekly bloggers malaise.

That’s where you have bags of time to prepare a blog, and solve the puzzle, take notes, and prepare the main part of the blog but leave the opening words till the last minute.  Then on every reminder click “remind me later” till it can’t be ignored.  Then realise you have largely forgotten about it all.

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