Putting the words to lights – crossword clues explained in plain English
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***
Morning All! It was nice to meet Cephas on Tuesday evening and I made the comment that puzzles don’t need to be hard to be enjoyable and this one is pretty much like that.
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
A pleasant puzzle which I didn’t find very difficult. 14 across, the key to several other clues, was readily solved and after this the puzzle was fairly straightforward.
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ****
I’m running a little late this morning, largely due to an early morning appointment. Here’s another excellent puzzle from Ray T.
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ****
I always enjoy a Micawber Toughie and this was no exception. It has some beautifully constructed clues and quite a few homophones (some of which work better than others). Let us know how you found it in a comment.
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ****
Hello again from the Vega Baja where Summer has arrived in the last few days!
I really enjoyed solving this puzzle but, as usual, writing the hints was far harder than the solve! I’m beginning to think Jay (presumably) is doing this on purpose to make my life difficult! This is my 10th blog of a Wednesday puzzle and for the first time we have a pangram, which I didn’t spot until putting in my last answer! (Has the DT slipped in a Shamus puzzle I wonder?).
There are a few tricky clues in this so I’ve given it 3* for difficulty but at least there are also a few easier ones to give you a start.
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
This puzzle from Cephas was at the lower end of Toughie difficulty, so why not give it a go?
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment **
This is a fairly straightforward puzzle and it shouldn’t pose too many problems. My greatest difficulty was in working out how some of the answers matched the definitions. Let us know how you got on in a comment.
If you want to see an answer highlight the gap between the brackets under the clue.
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BD Rating – Difficulty *** – Enjoyment ***
For some reason I made hard going of this, putting in “IN HAND” at 2d and then getting obsessed with the final word of 13a being BOOK didn’t help. As such this crossword gets three stars for difficulty today, although everybody else probably thought this was a doddle.
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As is usual for the weekend prize crosswords, I will select a few of the better clues and provide hints for them.
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BD Rating – Difficulty ***** – Enjoyment ***
Greetings from the Calder Valley.
The blog is tinged with sadness today as I learned yesterday of the death of Mike Laws. Mike was a former Times Crossword Editor, and was currently Independent Magazine (Inquisitor) Crossword Editor. Mike set puzzles under many pseudonyms including Fawley in the Guardian, Jude, Yorick and Ikela and others. I think he also had a couple of EV puzzles published in the Sunday Telegraph over the years. He also provided one in three of the Mephisto Crosswords in the Sunday Times. Many of you probably won’t have heard of him but his influence on the crossword world is immense. He was a larger-than-life character who was one of the experts both as a setter, editor and aficionado. His unusual appearance belied one of the most amazing minds and I know that many setters have benefited from his warm words of encouragement and advice.
A look at the Message Board on the Crossword Centre (http://www.boards2go.com/boards/board.cgi?&user=dharrison) will tell you the high regard in which Mike was held.
RIP Mike, we are all the better for having met and known you and your influence on the crossword world will live long with all of us.
Back to today’s Firefly and this was a ferocious challenge, one of the toughest we have had for a while. It’s a pangrammatic puzzle (one with all the letters of the alphabet inside). It is also noticeable that there aren’t too many correct solvers on the Telegraph leader-boards, which is a sure-fire indication of where this sits on the difficulty scale. Some clever clues, although a couple seemed a bit too clever for their own good. I found it quite difficult to get a foot-hold in the puzzle and although my first few answers were in the top right corner, so was the last one I entered!