shuchi

It’s pretty unusual for Aardvark to make a Friday appearance and it made for a pleasant change. A gentle, enjoyable crossword with clever misdirections and natural clue surfaces. 1a isn’t fully explained, help … Read more >>

The last time I blogged a Redshank crossword, its theme took me a long time to decipher. This was easy enough to work out with 5a being one of the first answers in. … Read more >>

From mathematics to religion to slang, Bradman draws from a breadth of topics to craft his clues today. I’m happy to have this puzzle to blog as my last post of 2011. Happy … Read more >>

I had a fun time solving this puzzle. The grid has four nearly independent mini-grids and I worked through them starting from the top-left, going anti-clockwise, with 10a as my last answer in.  … Read more >>

A puzzle of two halves for me. The bottom filled in fast while the top remained blank, till 7a gave me a breakthrough after looking up the French word for ‘queen’. Help invited … Read more >>

“Twelve clues lack a common definition”, said the opening line to the puzzle, but even after I was 50% through I hadn’t figured out what the definition was. Some clues (23a, 26d) did … Read more >>

A simple and neat, if somewhat bland, fare today. I liked solving this on the whole but missed having some high points to savour. Across 1 AFTER ALL dd 5 UTOPIA hidden in … Read more >>

I found a lot to admire in this puzzle and a few clues to struggle with. The bottom-right corner was hard to piece together with 20a and 20d eluding me till the very … Read more >>

A gentle puzzle with Falcon’s elegant clues and references to a variety of knowledge domains. Smooth anagrams, natural surfaces, nothing too taxing. Across 1 EMBALM M (male) BA (graduate), in ELM (tree) 5 … Read more >>

I generally have mixed feelings about Hamilton’s puzzles and this was no different. I like the conversational surface of some clues like 21A, 15D, 19D but wasn’t too happy with a few others … Read more >>

I enjoyed the light, elegant touch of Falcon in this offering. Straightforward except the bottom-right for me due to a couple of unfamiliar words, which I’m happy to have learnt. Across 1 WOLVERINE … Read more >>

A simple solve with a variety of clue types. I especially enjoyed 10a and 5d. Flimsy is extremely skilled at crafting smooth and natural clue surfaces. The not-so-nice parts: there is an error … Read more >>

Many delightful solving moments today. The puzzle opened with the line “Definitions in all across clues have something in common”, which was easy enough to decipher. I started with 8a and wondered how … Read more >>

A quick solve today. There were a few touches of wit (1d, 2d) but I am rather underwhelmed by the crossword overall. 1a seems to have an error and a couple of other … Read more >>

Entertaining crossword from Bradman with a “fishy” flavour and some deft anagrams. 1a, 25a, 2d, 4d, 6d amused me especially. The last two answers need your inputs.  // Updated, thanks to crypticsue. Across … Read more >>