Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27509
Hints and tips by Deep Threat
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ****
Buon giorno from Torre di Lago Puccini, in Tuscany, where the sun continues to shine. We went to Pisa yesterday and didn’t take a photo of me pretending to hold up the Leaning Tower.
The Don has marked today’s 70th anniversary of D-Day with a suitably themed puzzle, with several D-Day codewords and other WWII related items. I think, subject to correction, that the D-Day codewords are the ones which got the then Daily Telegraph setter into trouble when they appeared in his crosswords ahead of the event. Not too difficult today, and completed in ** time.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27504
A full review by crypticsue
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
This puzzle was published on Saturday, 31st May 2014
I solved this enjoyable pangram while my lovely grandson was having his Saturday morning nap – his idea of ‘helping’ Granny with crosswords was to take away the pen, chew it for a bit and then throw it across the room!
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Toughie No 1200 by Beam
Hints and tips by Bufo
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BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment ****
An enjoyable puzzle from Beam which shows all his usual trademarks (single word answers, no anagrams, short clues). There was nothing too difficult although I did slow down when it came to filling in the last few answers. The time taken took me into 4* difficulty territory.
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Sunday Telegraph Cryptic No 2745
A full review by crypticsue
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BD Rating – Difficulty * – Enjoyment ****
This puzzle was published on Sunday, 25th May 2014
Many thanks once again to Virgilius for our Sunday treat. This one was a fine example of the ‘a crossword doesn’t have to be difficult to be extremely enjoyable’ rule
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27508
Hints and tips by Falcon
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
Greetings from Ottawa where we are finally experiencing some seasonal weather.
I read through the across clues today without solving a single clue. However, the down clues came to my rescue and, in the end, the puzzle did not seem particularly difficult at all. For that I am thankful, as I am just getting back into the swing of things again after a couple of weeks of touring central Europe with nary a cryptic crossword in sight. That also explains why I am occupying the blogger’s chair a week later than I normally would.
Unless I am mistaken (and, according to the 2Kiwis, I may well be), an indicator seems to have been omitted from the clue at 23a. In my review, I have suggested a couple of possible amendments to the clue to make it work.
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Toughie No 1199 by Giovanni
Chinese Red
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BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment ****
Pretty tough today I thought with a fair bit of General Knowledge needed, but I did enjoy the challenge – thanks to Giovanni. It’s also a pangram. Talking of GK there was a contestant on yesterday’s edition of Pointless who thought that the Battle of Waterloo took place in England in the 1500s.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27507
Hints and tips by Big Dave
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
A typical Jay puzzle – if you have struggled then afterwards you can’t see why!
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Toughie No 1198 by Warbler
Hints and tips by Toro
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
[ Today I am pleased to introduce a gamekeeper turned poacher. You might know Toro from his puzzles in the NTSPP series and now he is trying his hand at blogging. An excellent debut. BD ]
A first outing for me as a blogger, and am I dreaming, or is that a personal message to me from Warbler in the form of 5d? (Well, not just to me of course). A lovely witty bit of setter-solver dialogue there, and I also enjoyed the imagery of 9a and the ingenuity of 17d.
Otherwise more straightforward than I had expected, so I’ll plump for ** for difficulty and *** for enjoyment. Perhaps BD’s breaking me in gently…
But never mind all that – you know the Toughie better than I do. What did you think?
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27506
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment **
We have a pretty straightforward puzzle today without much to get excited about. Do let us know what you thought and how you got on.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 27505
Hints and tips by Miffypops
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
We have a rather morbid theme running through todays offering which just about made it into three star difficulty thanks to 29 across (which I had seen before ) and 26 down. Very enjoyable.
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