Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2516
A full analysis by Peter Biddlecombe
+ – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – +
BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment *****
I found this puzzle a little harder than some Sunday ones, even on a second solve after mislaying my original copy. 9A in particular kept me guessing for quite a while both times, and I’m pretty sure it was my last answer first time around. Even after the thematic extravaganza just before Christmas, there’s still some seasonal material, with wassailing at 16D and two lots of shopping (6D, 21D).
Continue reading “ST 2516”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2515
A full analysis by Peter Biddlecombe
+ – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – +
BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment *****
Not too surprisingly, this puzzle has a seasonal greeting and many seasonal answers and clues – only five clue/answer combinations have nothing to do with Christmas or midwinter, by my reckoning. I went slightly astray by guessing a wrong continuation of the greeting in 28A, but this didn’t hold me up for long. There’s a fair number of very easy clues and a bit of repetition (one = I occurs at least three times) but the entertainment and theme is worth it. The message is repeated from me, especially if you should be reading this on the day when it’s scheduled to appear, with the addition of “, bloggers, setters and editors”. Now go back to your family and/or friends!
[As usual, I wrote this before reading the comments on Sunday – pleased to see that Brian has abandoned whatever anonymity he’d managed to keep. I hope my reports on his puzzles don’t sound too creepy – he’s one of my favourite setters and that’s hard to disguise. If there is anything to criticise, I’ll be on to it, but he doesn’t slip up very often!]
Continue reading “ST 2515”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2514
A full analysis by Peter Biddlecombe
+ – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – +
BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment *****
Apologies for posting late – got too involved in the live webchat and blog discussions of today’s Times puzzle.
This was a slow puzzle for me, as all the answers I found difficult were in the same corner – 4A, 13A, 6D, 8D. Solving these took about 4/3 of the time needed for the rest of the puzzle.
Continue reading “ST 2514”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2513
A full analysis by Peter Biddlecombe
+ – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – +
BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment *****
A fairly tricky puzzle, this one. Someone on Sunday asked whether the “level at which they are set is in the gift of the setter for the day or whether the crossword editor issues guidance to toughen things up or to ease back a little?” I’m sure some attention is paid to this, and I believe the daily setters have some notion of a general desire for the Telegraph puzzle to avoid some of the tougher vocabulary and “general” knowledge that you might need for other broadsheet puzzles (or the Toughies); but I hope they don’t spend too much time agonising about difficulty, because it’s so hard to measure. Two different people of the same ability level can give you completely different reports about the difficulty of a puzzle, whether they’re beginners or experts. In this puzzle, knowing some fairly standard cryptic xwd material probably helped a lot in keeping the solving time down.
Sunsetter seems to have gone for a bit of Times crossword nostalgia here – this grid is the quirkiest one in the current Times set. It was made by former Times xwd editor Edmund Akenhead, and the big black E is his “signature”. It’s also the only Times grid with answers you might not have to solve at all – the two fully checked four-letter answers.
Continue reading “ST 2513”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2512
A full analysis by Peter Biddlecombe
+ – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – +
BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment *****
Another easy but very classy puzzle from “Sunsetter”. I wondered whether there was a little theme when the two crossing words in the middle both had two Vs and so did 8D, but I guess this could just come from the need to fit in with the two long across answers.
Continue reading “ST 2512”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2511
A full analysis by Peter Biddlecombe
+ – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – +
BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment ****
Quite tricky for me, this one – possibly the hardest Sunday puzzle for me since I started blogging them, though partly from one of those unfortunate groupings of answers that were hard for me – 16D, 17D, 20A, 27A. If one of these had been in each 20A, they would have caused far less trouble! Another source of difficulty might be the simple fact that every answer except 14D is a single word – this seems to make cheap guessed answers harder to come by. (As usual, I’m writing this before seeing what anyone said on the day, so look forward to finding “This was a doddle” comments when I do …)
Note after reading the Sunday hints messages – the newspaper material in 27A’s wordplay is repeated elsewhere, for a “Nina” that completely passed me by – you can find the Sun in 6D, Independent in 3D, Mail in 14D, and Guardian in 12D. If you want to really push it, the Melbourne Age (9A) and and New London [Connecticut] Day (21A) are also there, along with stories (23A) and just the one lie (15A). I found these while failing to notice the Mail.
Continue reading “ST 2511”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2510
A full analysis by Peter Biddlecombe
+ – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – +
BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ****
Another dose of quality, this week with a govt/military flavour in quite a few of the long answers – Magna Carta, Victoria Cross, esprit de corps, and secret service. Overall difficulty matched an easy but not very easy Times puzzle.
Continue reading “ST 2510”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2509
A full analysis by Peter Biddlecombe
+ – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – + – +
BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment ****
Quite a tricky Sunday puzzle by current standards – especially if like me you don’t see 1A on first look.
Continue reading “ST 2509”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2508
A full analysis by Big Dave
+ – + – + – + – + – + – + – +
BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
Tilsit’s review is a little late, so I have decided to publish the answers and the essentials of the wordplay.
Continue reading “ST 2508”
Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2507
A full analysis by Big Dave
+ – + – + – + – + – + – + – +
BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ****
With Peter Biddlecombe on holiday, the pleasure of writing the review passes back to me for a couple of weeks. This was another excellent puzzle, such a pity that, based on blog page views, this is the least solved Telegraph crossword of the week.
Leave a comment telling us what you thought. You can also add your assessment by selecting from one to five stars at the bottom of the post.
Continue reading “ST 2507”