Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26303
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment ***
Two clues turned this Shamus puzzle, for me, from a 3* to a 4* for difficulty – 14a which was the last to go in and which I’d have got much quicker if I’d realised earlier that it contained the one letter necessary to turn the puzzle into a pangram, and 30a which I made much more difficult by foolishly writing in 23d as a noun rather than a verb. Let us know how you got on in a comment.
If you need to see the answers, they are hidden between the brackets under the clues. Just drag your cursor through the white space between the brackets to reveal one.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26302
Hints and tips by Libellule
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
One of Rufus’ easier crosswords today – I think. If I hadn’t initially put Victoria in at 2d it would have been a “one or two stopper” to quote Prolixic. But that still doesn’t stop it from being entertaining and a fun crossword to do.
If the hints don’t help, just highlight the space in the curly brackets to reveal the answer.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26301 (Hints)
Big Dave’s Saturday Crossword Club
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You will probably have gathered by now that the Wedding of the Year was held yesterday – hence the hints being a bit late.
This was me and the missus yesterday (taken by Tilsit):
And this is the happy couple:
I’ve added a few other pics to the facebook page.
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Toughie No 394 by Elgar
Here Comes The Groom
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
I have been asked to do today’s blog because Big Dave and several other bloggers are off to London to celebrate Elgar’s wedding. Elgar obviously doesn’t want the rest of us to have an easy time either. I found this very difficult and well worthy of being described as a toughie. In the end I did manage to finish it before having to check a couple of answers in the dictionary. There’s still the odd bit of wordplay that I haven’t quite sorted out and I await enlightenment. And I wonder whether I’ve missed any thematic material.
Please 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.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26300
Hints and tips by Gazza
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BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment ***
If last week’s Giovanni was a pussycat then this one has considerably sharper teeth. It may not be a lion but it’s at least a cheetah. But it is a well-behaved cheetah with Giovanni’s usual impeccable clueing. Tell us what you think of it in a comment!
As always the answers are hidden between the brackets under the clues. Highlight the white space between the brackets to reveal.
I’m posting this a little earlier than usual because I’m keen to get to grips with the Toughie to find out what Elgar has provided for us on this auspicious occasion.
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Toughie No 393 by Kcit
Going through (Spaghetti) Hoops!
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ****
A fine Thursday puzzle by Kcit with a good set of challenging clues beautifully written with nice surface readings. The answer to 1 across appeared in DT Cryptic 26263 last month, which I also blogged.
I’d also like to take this opportunity to wish my dear friends John H (Elgar / Enigmatist / Nimrod) and Jane T (Jetdoc) all the best on the occasion of their wedding tomorrow. I hope to be at the reception and look forward to toasting their health and happiness, along with many crossword friends.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26295
A full review by Crypticsue
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
Cephas gave us a very enjoyable crossword this week – Barrie summed it up nicely “ Very interesting and enjoyable puzzle … very tough in parts… but … an encouraging start” and I can’t think of anything I could say which would describe it up any better than that. My BD rating reflects the difficulty of some of the clues and the fact that we all got a great deal of pleasure from solving the puzzle.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26299
Hints and tips by Big Dave
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment **
It’s mystery setter time again. If you don’t enjoy charades, then you’d better give this one a miss! A couple of good clues get all but drowned out by the rest, but they rescued this puzzle from one-star status.
Please 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.
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Toughie No 392 by Notabilis
A Mohican in Barnet?
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BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment ****
Notabilis has given us a thoroughly entertaining puzzle with a good sprinkling of “aha” moments. As always with Notabilis, there seem to be two stages involved in solving the puzzle – firstly finding the answers, and then for a number of clues working out why. Let me know in a comment if you enjoyed both processes as much as I did.
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Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26298
Hints and tips by Crypticsue
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
I thoroughly enjoyed this Wednesday’s offering from Jay. A lovely mix of clues, anagrams, hidden words, all-in-ones and even one of those pesky every other letter ones which I am only just (even after all these years) managing to recognise. Thank you Jay for giving me such a nice puzzle to review. I hope you all agree with my opinion and don’t all rush for the 5d! Hard to pick favourite clues today but I will plump for 1d, 17d and 21d.
Please 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.
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