Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 25990 – Hints
Selected hints by Big Dave
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment: ***
As with most Suturday puzzles, this one is quite easy.
For the next two days I am trying an experiment with a new WordPress feature. 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. Please remember you are assessing the puzzle and not my attempt to explain it! If enough of you use this feature then it will be retained for future puzzles, so it’s up to you – vote now.
At the moment the rating system can’t be turned on post by post, which means you can rate any previous puzzle. While you are welcome to do that (and some already have) it would seem unlikely that the numbers entered will be sufficient for a realistic rating.
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, 30th July.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 25984 – Hints
Selected hints by Big Dave
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
This has been a particularly good week, and it does seem that many of the setters are raising their game. I hope that is in part due to the feedback that they have received from this blog. While I would expect that some notice is taken of the opinions of the person writing the individual review, it is your comments that have the biggest impact, so keep them rolling in. Everyone concerned, whether thay be bloggers or setters, is interested in what you have to say.
Now to today’s puzzle. A improvement on last Saturday, but while the inclusion of two well-known places, and names from art and literature were absolutely fine, I was disappointed by the girl’s name at 26 across. I do wish that these prize puzzles were a bit harder, but I’ve gone over that ground before. I was sent a copy of last Saturday’s prize puzzle from The Independent, and it was a breath of fresh air!
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, 23rd July.
Continue reading “DT 25984 – Hints”
Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 25978 – Hints
Selected hints by Big Dave
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment **
A disappointing crossword with some clues, like 17a and 3d, that are past their sell-by date, some, like 15a and 6d, that just don’t work and others, like 10a and 5d that are not worthy of being in a prize puzzle. And I haven’t even mentioned the proper nouns as, apart from 5d, they are acceptable.
As is usual for the weekend prize crosswords, I will select a few of the better clues and provide hints for them. Peter Biddlecombe should, by now, have returned from holiday ready to do a full review of this puzzle in time for 12.00 on Thursday, 16th July.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 25972 – Hints
Selected hints by Big Dave
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BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment ***
First I’d like to say a special thank you to Gazza for stepping in to help me out yesterday. It all started when I switched the computer on yesterday morning, only to find that the graphics card had given up the ghost. I did eventually manage to find a very old one, but that card didn’t know what a wide screen looked like. Off to PC World where I had to buy a new motherboard, cpu, and memory to accommodate the new graphics card. At this point the hard drive crashed for the third time in as many months, so it was back again for a new drive. By the time that I had reloaded Windows and found out that the new graphics card was faulty it was nearly midnight. Fortunately I was able to use the onboard graphics controller, so I’m able to do this morning’s blog.
A much better puzzle this week from our Saturday Supremo. There is a village, but it has an indelible place in British history.
As is usual for the weekend prize crosswords, I will select a few of the better clues and provide hints for them. Peter Biddlecombe is on holiday this week, but a full review of this puzzle will still be published at 12.00 on Thursday, 9th July.
Continue reading “DT 25972 – Hints”
Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 25966 – Hints
Selected hints by Big Dave
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment **
A disappointing Prize Puzzle from our Saturday Supremo. As long as you know the London Underground system you should have no problems today.
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, 2nd July.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 25960 – Hints
Selected hints by Big Dave
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ****
Our Saturday setter shows what can be done, with the best prize puzzle for quite a while. Put the atlas away, and those books of baby names, all you need this week is to sip on a cocktail.
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, 25th June.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 25954 – Hints
Selected hints by Big Dave
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
A good puzzle which, for me, was spoilt by the return of the dreaded place names. Just to make things worse, three of the four are interlinked. As I have previously remarked, if I want a General Knowledge crossword I will do the Telegraph’s excellent Giant GK puzzle. To me it’s a lazy way of filling the grid, and I always have more respect for setters that avoid them.
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, 18th June.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 25948 – Hints
Selected hints by Big Dave
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ****
I really enjoyed this Saturday puzzle, and I hope that those girls and boys names and obscure towns are gone forever.
There is an expectation that the Saturday prize puzzle will be more difficult than the weekday ones, but this has certainly not been the case in the Telegraph in recent years. Being cynical, I suspect that this is a marketing ploy designed to sell more copies of the newspaper!
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, 11th June.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 25942 – Hints
Selected hints by Big Dave
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ****
An altogether better puzzle this week, albeit a little easier than last week. The handful of proper nouns are clued reasonably well, and I quite liked the unusual grid.
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, 4th June.
Continue reading “DT 25942 – Hints”
Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 25936 – Hints
Selected hints by Big Dave
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment **
Once again we have a reasonable puzzle which, for me, was spoilt by the geography lesson that belongs in a general knowledge crossword. This week’s name is the same Welsh one that came up in DT 25906.
Peter Biddlecombe’s full review of this puzzle will be published at 12.00 on Thursday, 28th May.
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