Toughie No 3035 by Firefly
Hints and tips by Twmbarlwm
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BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment ****
Good afternoon. I’m in Gazza’s Thursday chair for one week only, and what a superb puzzle this was for my first Toughie blog: beautifully composed with a wide variety of devices and deceptions, and some clever thematic clues relating to the opening solution. The difficulty rating might be a little lower for anyone who got the gateway solution quicker than I did!
Continue reading “Toughie 3035”
Toughie No 3015 by Firefly
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
Thanks to Firefly for an enjoyable puzzle with a theme. Thanks largely to the education offered by crosswords in the past I did know all the theme elements.… Continue reading
Toughie No 2987 by Firefly
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty ***/**** – Enjoyment ***
I spent longer sorting out the wordplay than I did solving this Firefly puzzle. I do enjoy disentangling complicated wordplay but I was still rather glad when I got to the end of the hints.… Continue reading
Toughie No 2963 by Firefly
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
Thanks to Firefly for brightening up a horribly dark squally day in North Devon. He has given us an enjoyable puzzle with an ursine theme.
Please leave a comment telling us how you fared and what you thought of the puzzle.… Continue reading
Toughie No 2939 by Firefly
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty ***/**** – Enjoyment ***
I found parts of this quite tricky (which I can’t blame entirely on the severe case of man flu that I’m currently suffering from) and I can’t fully understand 21a (so any suggestions there would be welcome).… Continue reading
Toughie No 2907 by Firefly
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty **/*** – Enjoyment ***
Thanks to Firefly for a pleasant Thursday Toughie. There are two words that I didn’t know which made me add an extra half-star for difficulty.
Please leave a comment telling us how you fared and what you thought of the puzzle.… Continue reading
Toughie No 2843 by Firefly
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
Firefly has given us a theme today – I counted ten eleven (Thanks to Jonners for correcting my counting) answers fitting the theme. Thanks to Firefly.… Continue reading
Toughie No 2822 by Firefly
Hints and tips by crypticsue
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
Firefly’s turn to provide the Wednesday Toughie Continue reading “Toughie 2822”
Toughie No 2807 by Firefly
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
Thanks to Firefly for an enjoyable puzzle.
Please leave a comment telling us how you fared and what you thought of the puzzle.
Across Clues
1a Sweet spoils hero may initially grant (11)
MARSHMALLOW: string together a verb meaning spoils, the initial letters of Hero May and a verb to grant.… Continue reading
Toughie No 2779 by Firefly
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
Stephen L is lucky to have some sun in South Devon because here in the North of the County it’s a horribly wet, cold day.
It’s Firefly on duty today (thanks to him) and he’s given us a reasonably gentle puzzle including a fairly high anagram count.… Continue reading