RatkojaRiku

A(nother) tidy set of exquisitely sound clues today from Dac, through which I worked more quickly than is usual for me with one of his puzzles. I needed Wikipedia to confirm that 13 … Read more >>

I have only previously blogged one Mordred puzzle, and my blog on that day concluded as follows: “Overall, I think that Mordred made a mere mortal such as me work a little bit … Read more >>

My apologies for the later than usual posting, caused by other commitments as well as by the trickiness of the puzzle. Nimrod never disappoints: you know he’ll never hand you a solution on … Read more >>

For me at least, this puzzle took longer to solve than the average Scorpion, and I will need some input from fellow solvers to explain one or two clues. Having seen the grid, … Read more >>

After a struggle with last week’s puzzle, it was nice to be back in Dac’s safe hands again today. This was an easier-than-average Dac solve for me this morning, with some fairly accessible … Read more >>

We have vintage Nestor on display this morning in a puzzle that truly showcases his brilliance as a compiler – and my lack of brilliance as a solver, alas. After slotting in a … Read more >>

I haven’t blogged many Klingsor puzzles – just two to date – and don’t really have much a track record against him, so I approached this with a degree of trepidation in a … Read more >>

It’s Tuesday and the puzzle has been set b(u)y Scorpion, so there just has to be a theme to it, I thought, and Scorpion did not let me down. As themes go, this … Read more >>

Another crop of concisely worded, sound clues with silky smooth surface readings – one would expect nothing else of Dac, of course. As Ali mentioned in his Dac blog last week, let’s hope … Read more >>

I looked through my past blogs this morning to see if I had blogged a Monk before, and to my surprise, since Monk has featured on my crosswording landscape for a very long … Read more >>

Like many readers, I have been pigging out on crosswords as well as on turkey and mince pies over the past week, with so many Christmas specials to get my teeth into. Why … Read more >>

I hadn’t blogged a Scorpion for a while and when I realised that the Tuesday slot had fallen to me, I was hoping it might be one. True to form, Scorpion did not … Read more >>

I was looking forward to a Dac puzzle this Wednesday morning and I was not disappointed: a set of tightly clued entries with fathomable wordplay, yet enough of a challenge to tease the … Read more >>

Having enjoyed my last encounter with Nestor a month ago, from which I emerged with my solver’s pride more or less intact, I was relishing the prospect of solving this one when I … Read more >>

I found that I raced through most of this one before grinding to a standstill when just one or two clues from the end. Bizarrely, 1 kept me guessing till the very end, … Read more >>