Putting the words to lights – crossword clues explained in plain English
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
Afternoon All!. Last Sunday gave us another archetypal Virgilius puzzle. No nonsense, no theme, just a series of well crafted clues with a few pleasing ‘penny-drop moments’ and not much too trouble judging from the comments on the day.
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
We have a typical Giovanni today – a couple of religious references, a couple of new words (for me, anyway) but all impeccably clued. Let us know what you thought of it in a comment.
If you want to see an answer drag your cursor through the space between the curly brackets under the relevant clue.
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BD Rating – Difficulty ***/**** – Enjoyment ***
Quite a few of us found this week’s prize puzzle from Cephas slightly more tricky than usual. The obvious ones went in straight away and some of the stragglers took a while for the penny to drop, but in the end the whole thing was solved in my usual time. Thanks to Cephas for the enjoyable challenge.
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
Another gentle puzzle from Kcit which should not have caused many problems. The US side in 7 down is possibly the only obscure thing in the puzzle.
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment **
Judging by the early recorded times on Telegraph Puzzles (that is those times entered before the cheats have come along) it seems that several people found this puzzle difficult, so I have opted for three stars rather than two (that probably won’t be enough for some!). Although I had no difficulties in solving, I thought that several of the constructs were bordering on unfair.
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
When I first read through the clues to this puzzle I thought that it was going to cause me a lot of problems, but in fact I managed to progress fairly steadily through it, helped by a couple of guesses at answers based on the definition and checking letters, which I then had to justify retrospectively from the wordplay. I have a couple of niggles but on the whole I enjoyed it.
Let us know what you thought in a comment and please take the time to register how much you liked it by clicking on one of the stars below.
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BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment ***
Hello from the Vega Baja on a beautiful sunny morning. At least the weather here has resumed normal service over the last few days!
Maybe it’s just me but I think Jay has raised the bar a little on this one and based on my solving time I’ve had to give it 4* for difficulty. (I really must stop staying up late to solve the crossword. It doesn’t come online until 0100CEST and my brain isn’t really in gear at that time of the morning! )
A nice mix of clues with a couple of obscure words and phrases to get you thinking.
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BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment ***
This and some other recent Messinae Toughies have been considerably tougher than his earlier puzzles. The enjoyment level was let down by some pretty awful surface readings – I leave you to work out to which clues I am referring!.
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BD Rating – Difficulty ***/**** – Enjoyment ***
This Sunday’s puzzle was for me a ‘crossword of two halves’. The left hand side went in quite quickly but the right hand side, and particularly the NE corner, was a different matter, hence the 3.5 stars for difficulty. The usual enjoyable mix of clues so thanks are due once again to Virgilius for some great entertainment, albeit slightly more taxing than usual for me at least.
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
We have an unknown setter today (but a different one from last week, unless I’m very much mistaken). I thought that this was enjoyable and just about the right level of difficulty for the back-page puzzle – let us know what you thought in a comment.
To reveal an answer highlight the space between the brackets under the clue.