Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26014 – Hints
Selected hints by Big Dave
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment: **
The girls are back in town – or at least one of them – and you still need to keep your atlas handy for this Saturday puzzle. The grid is one of those dreadful ones that only the Telegraph, among quality dailies, still allows. This is four puzzles in one, joined only by the two long answers.
If you are using CluedUp today, then check the printable version for the correct wording of 9 across. This problem has now been fixed! Just why this site can’t handle accented words and randomly drops apostrophes is a mystery.
Don’t forget that you can give your assessment of the puzzle. Five stars if you thought it was great, one if you hated it, four, three or two if it was somewhere in between.
As is usual for the weekend prize crosswords, I will select a few of the better clues and provide hints for them. Peter Biddlecombe’s full review of this puzzle will be published at 12.00 on Thursday, 27th August.
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Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2497 – Review
A full analysis by Big Dave
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ****
Yet another winner from our Sunday Setter.
At the bottom of the post you will see an array of five stars – use these to give your assessment of the puzzle. Five stars if you thought it was great, one if you hated it, four, three or two if it was somewhere in between.
Continue reading “ST 2497 – Review”
Toughie No 203 by MynoT
Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ****
Last time I reviewed a Toughie from MynoT I said it was “difficult in places, but overall very enjoyable” – this one is very much the same. Some of the difficulties are described below, and if you can help then please leave a comment.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26013
Hints and tips by Libellule
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BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment ****
Beware of what you ask for. After last Friday’s gentle stroll, today’s crossword is certainly not a walk in the park. Today we have a much more difficult crossword, although that does not detract from its enjoyment. (Even if the grid is a bit cornery).
Please take some time to enjoy the excellent surface readings.
As usual feel free to leave your comments.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26008 – Review
A full analysis by Peter Biddlecombe
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A puzzle of moderate difficulty and the usual Saturday mixed bag of clues …
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Toughie No 202 by Warbler
Look Before You Leap!
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
Today marks a first for yours truly! I actually agree with the current score given by solvers on Clued Up for the puzzle. It was a pleasant enough puzzle until I came to submit my entry and found I had three wrong answers. One was a typo because of the quirkiness of the entry system which frequently sends the cursor off at the wrong angle, but I also had two wrong answers; both of which were down to not reading the clue properly. Having suitably chastised myself, I entered the correct solutions and was done for another day.
One of those puzzles that would make a good daily challenge, but on the easy side for a Toughie. A couple of clever clues and one or two to make me smile. All in all a nice battle with an amiable setter.
This is the third time I have started this blog. I saved it to send to Big Dave but forgot that I had transferred it to my laptop and was saving the doc to an email, and of course it didn’t save.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26012
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ****
I found this puzzle very enjoyable with some excellent surface readings. Please let us know what you thought of it, via a comment, and cast a vote by clicking on one of the stars at the bottom.
As usual, the answers are hidden inside the curly brackets, so that you can just reveal an answer that you need, by selecting the white space, without accidentally seeing other answers.
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Toughie No 201 by Cephas
Wednesday’s Child is Full of Woe
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment *
Maybe it is something to do with seeing that black cat chasing a magpie while I was walking under a ladder yesterday. For whatever reason I seem to have been unlucky with the Toughie today. We have a number of cryptic definitions, which, not to beat about the bush, are pretty woeful, and we have several clues where the word order has been manipulated to try to improve the surface reading.
Am I being unfair? Perhaps you loved it – please leave us a comment! And please record a vote for how much you enjoyed it by clicking on one of the stars at the bottom.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26011
Hints and tips by Big Dave
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment **
This is an easy puzzle, which should leave you plenty of time to tackle today’s Toughie from Cephas, our regular Saturday setter. This week there is no surfeit of cryptic definitions, but you do find yourself expecting that if it isn’t an anagram then it might be a hidden word!
You can add your assessment by selecting from one to five stars at the bottom of the post.
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Toughie No 200 by Citrus
Opportunity didn’t knock!
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
I was expecting something special from this Toughie, but what I got was a puzzle in which the difficulty only came from obscure words and a particularly tricky wordplay.
Continue reading “Toughie 200”