Toughie No 656 by Excalibur
Bob’s Your Uncle
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment **
Well, there’s one example of a weird surface (22a) and a couple of cryptic definitions which don’t work very well in my opinion, but on the whole I thought this one was pretty reasonable if not too stimulating. It’s not terribly difficult – I completed three-quarters of it in almost record time but then slowed down in the NW corner, so I think this setter definitely belongs to Tuesdays rather than Wednesdays (Puzzles Editor please note) – perhaps a swap with Beam would be in order? 
Let us know how you got on and please take the time to record your enjoyment of it by clicking on one of the stars below.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26693
Hints and tips by Falcon
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
Greetings from Canada where we are bracing for the first frost of the season. Today, we have a quintessential Jay puzzle, populated with lots of charades, plenty of clues where one must either take or delete the first, last or middle letters, and sprinkled with a few substitutions (A for B type clues). It took me longer than normal to complete it – but that is undoubtedly due to attempting to watch a hockey game at the same time (and, yes, my team did win).
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Toughie No 655 by Beam
A Ray of Sunshine
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BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment *****
It’s my lucky day again – a Toughie from one of my favourite setters.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26692
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
A couple of weeks ago I asked whether having only two anagrams in a puzzle was a record. Well, if it was it’s been well and truly beaten today because this one has none at all. How refreshing! It does mean that we get a lot of charade-type clues but I’m not going to complain about that. Give us a comment with your views.
To see an answer just highlight the space between the brackets under the clue.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26691
Hints and tips by Libellule
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
After doing yesterday’s excellent crossword late in the afternoon sat outside in the sunshine with a glass of wine, I got to do this equally excellent crossword from Rufus this morning in the dark and cold with a cup of tea. I thought this was a bit harder and more trickier than we usually get on a Monday morning but that didn’t detract from my enjoyment. Last corner to fall was the NE with 1a and 2d holding me up for a little while.
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Toughie No 654 by Elgar
Parlez-Vous Franglais?
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment *****
Tilsit has been dragged from the drainpipe in which he was hiding after being shot at by NATO warplanes and detained somewhere in the desert, so you’ve got me again! The hardest part of this puzzle was unravelling some of the wordplay, which was not helped by the error in the published clue for 14a/16a.
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Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2610
A full review by Crypticsue
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***/****
This excellent Sunday Virgilius just sneaks into 3* difficulty territory because of the problems I had with why the solution to 6d was what it was (I wasn’t alone!) and the slightly longer solving time, not to mention one application of Tippex! I still can’t make up my mind whether it’s 3* or 4* enjoyment but it was definitely a great start to Sunday morning however many stars it gets.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26689
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
I didn’t think that this was one of Giovanni’s more challenging puzzles, but it may come as a bit of a relief to some after yesterday’s effort. I’ve written this with one eye on the TV – hard luck, Wales (if only they’d remembered to pack their kicking boots!), we’ll have to wait for 2015 now.
If you want to see an answer just highlight the space between the brackets under the relevant clue.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26684
A full review by gnomethang
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BD Rating –Difficulty ** – Enjoyment **
Morning All! This was a very straightforward puzzle, a fact borne out by my solving time. Absolutely nothing wrong with it but I felt there was not too much to stir the chuckle-muscles..
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Toughie No 653 by Elkamere
Hints and tips by Bufo
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BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment ****
I was pleased to get an Elkamere today and it turned out to be a proper Toughie which was most enjoyable and most challenging. I filled the left-hand side in without too much difficulty but it took me a long time to get a decent toehold in the right-hand side.
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