Prize Puzzle – 045 – Big Dave's Crossword Blog
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Prize Puzzle – 045

Monthly Prize Puzzle (February 2016)

A Puzzle by Radler

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Why not have a go at our latest Monthly Prize Puzzle?

The winner will receive their choice of any of the Telegraph Crossword Books published by Hamlyn.

Please note that, due to punitive postal charges, while the competition is open to all, the prize is only available to UK solvers.

A review will follow after the closing date (20th February 2016).

The competition is now closed

The puzzle is available by clicking on the above grid.

I’ve left this post open for comments, but if you don’t want your comment to be deleted then avoid asking for or giving help with the clues.


17 comments on “Prize Puzzle – 045

  1. Tough one! I was stuck at an early stage so made an educated guess at the theme from two partial answers and that helped a lot. Was slightly thrown by the fact that the missing answer does sort of appear in the puzzle, but read the instructions again and think I have right answer. Excellent work to get everything in. I liked 23, 27 , 29 a and 8 and 13d.
    Is the enumeration of 4d right?

    1. I see what you mean by the missing member ‘sort of appearing’ in the puzzle. I suspect that’s either a coincidence or (more likely) Radler being ultra devious.
      This is a really enjoyable puzzle – top clues for me are 10a, 12a, 27a, 1d and 7d.

  2. Very nice radler – lovely tight clueing, brilliant misleads, and plenty of laughs – and fun looking for the 28ac. I haven’t parsed 7d fully.

    No idea what beet is seeing for the missing member – oh I think I do now. But all the others are more direct.

    Many thanks

  3. Great stuff! I found this very challenging but very enjoyable. Eventually I got it all done and parsed successfully except for unravelling the wordplay for what is obviously the correct answer for 26d.

    Lots of clues floated my boat, but I particularly liked 8d. Shouldn’t 4d be enumerated (4,6)?

    Many thanks, Radler

  4. That was a struggle. Must admit that I did not identify the theme until I had completed the grid and then had a think about it. The SE corner was the last for me to solve so did not have 28a until late in the process. Very challenging and very rewarding.
    Thanks Radler.

    1. It is now Monday morning here and I have been having another look at the puzzle and very much suspect that I have submitted an incorrect answer. I think I have found the “Beet” word and missed one of the others. Never mind, but no HAG for me this month. :cry:

  5. Phew! Hit a brick wall half way through with only NE and SW corners done, so went looking for a possible theme in what I had. Thank goodness, don’t think I’d have managed it otherwise!
    Great stuff Radler, felt like tackling an Araucaria!

  6. Maybe, if I found the theme, I’d be doing better. As it is, I seem to have invented a fair number of new words. :unsure:

  7. The right amount of difficulty you would expect from a Monthly Prize.
    Some really ingenious clueing.
    Thanks to Radler.

  8. Phew that was tough, Mr. Radler. You seemed like such a nice man at the Birthday party………..!

  9. This was a long time in the solving, with plenty of family-friendly curses. Took me the best part of an hour to get going in the first place :wacko: but once I spotted the theme I knew I had to finish it… painfully slowly. Cannot fully parse 5 and 7 (and suspect I have 5 wrong anyway). Best clues, 8 and 12, and very impressive to accommodate the theme so neatly. Thank you, Radler.

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