October 13, 2011 – Big Dave's Crossword Blog

Toughie 649

Toughie No 649 by MynoT

A Load of C

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BD Rating – Difficulty **Enjoyment ***

Greetings from the Calder Valley. Bufo and I have swapped duties this week as I have a couple of hospital appointments tomorrow. Thanks to him for agreeing to this. I eagerly awaited the appearance of the puzzle at midnight and my heart sank when I saw it was by MynoT, who I have to say is not one of my favourite setters. My gloom deepened when I saw the grid full of double unchecked squares (another bête-noir) and so I set to.

However, I was pleasantly surprised and appreciated the effort that went into the puzzle. I am aware that for the gimmick hidden within the puzzle (all the answers contain the letter C) to work, you probably need to use a grid like this, so I’ll say no more on the topic (cue sighs of relief from the TCE!). Not up to the really high standards of the past few puzzles, but still a worthy member of the Toughie canon.

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DT 26682

Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26682

Hints and tips by Big Dave

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BD Rating – Difficulty ****Enjoyment ****

I found this to be one of Ray T’s tougher back-page puzzles. I put this down to misdirection as every clue was easily solvable.

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Puzzles for Thursday 13th of October

Puzzles for Thursday 13th of October

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Today’s puzzles, courtesy of Phil McNeill, the Telegraph’s Puzzles Editor.  Today we also have the Sudoku, Kakuro, Codewords and Mind Gym puzzles.

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