Never knowingly undersolved
Phi has produced this Friday’s puzzle, as he does the puzzle on most Fridays. I actually found this crossword towards the harder end of the Phi spectrum, in that I really struggled with … Read more >>
Scorpion set today’s puzzle. Thursday is often a theme day. Although there was a theme you didn’t have to know it. Most of the across entries are the surnames of … Read more >>
I found this to be a bit of a mixed bag, some very easy entries and some, such as 18ac, that took a little while to sort out the parsing. There are quite … Read more >>
The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/cryptic/27194.
Monday Prize Crossword / May 1, 2017
It doesn’t happen very often that we see a Dante on two consecutive Mondays.
Guardian readers are used to have one Rufus after the other, FT customers usually get only half the amount.
Prize puzzle from the Weekend FT of April 29, 2017 I found this a slightly difficult puzzle, especially in the top-left corner. My clue of the week is 18a (SERENADE) which may qualify … Read more >>
Another nice puzzle from Monk, a bit trickier than the last few of his that I have blogged.
A characteristically elegant and witty puzzle from Nutmeg. Getting the four long answers early on certainly helped towards a straightforward but entertaining solve. Thank you, Nutmeg – I really enjoyed it. Definitions are … Read more >>
An excellent puzzle from Eccles with soundness (I think) coupled with very pleasing surfaces. I found this very hard to begin with — none of the Acrosses fell at first sight — and then there were plenty of accessible Downs. Finally I stopped, having spent ages and failed on 22ac and 25ac. One of them is a (to me) dreaded cryptic definition, so there weren’t the usual two ways to the answer and I couldn’t see the required one; the other one (25ac) is still a bit of a mystery; no doubt someone will explain it better than I can.
Inquisitor puzzle by Harribobs … memories of BATS, struggling with the start of the endgame … Preamble: In some clues, wordplay leads to the answer plus an extra letter; extra letters spell … Read more >>
A fun puzzle from Hoskins today – mostly fairly straightforward, but with a few that got us thinking. We only realised that there was more to the puzzle when we had moreorless … Read more >>
Thanks Sleuth, for an enjoyable puzzle. Definitions are underlined in the clues. Across 1 Menial sort after day taking goods by ground (8) DOGSBODY : D(abbrev. for “day”) plus(after … taking) anagram of(… … Read more >>
Difficult in places and enjoyable throughout. Favourites were 9ac, 27ac, 1dn, 8dn, 16dn and 21dn – thanks, Picaroon.
We’re standing in for Pierre today and this is the first Quiptic we’ve blogged. Joyce often tackles the Quiptic if she is eating lunch on her own, so it isn’t the first Quiptic that we have solved!
An enjoyable outing from the reliable Vigo.