A lovely surprise to see Orlando occupying the Quiptic slot this week.
Azed 2286
Apologies for the slightly delayed appearance of this blog – I had made a start on it last Sunday and then completely forgot about it. Fairly average on the Azed difficulty scale, I … Read more >>
Independent on Sunday 1,363 by Hypnos
Good Sunday cryptic stuff from Hypnos once again. Last one in was 6 down, where the wordplay took me a moment to spot, but raised a smile once I did. Across 1 MAHREZ … Read more >>
Everyman 3,625
The puzzle may be found at https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/everyman/3625.
Genius 153 / Vlad
It’s time for my biannual Guardian Genius blog and this time Vlad is the setter The preamble stated "Fourteen solutions are derived from seven common word pairs, each having a … Read more >>
Independent 9194 by Scorpion (02-04-2016)
Scorpion has the honour(?) of being the first Saturday Crossword available to solve on the Independent online site in the same manner as the usual daily puzzles on the day it is published. … Read more >>
Enigmatic Variations 1218 Cat by Stick Insect
A cat themed puzzle this week. One that brings mangled presents from eight answers these must be removed before entry. Sounds typical of a cat! These then need to be listed under the … Read more >>
Guardian Prize 26,842 / Maskarade
I spent a rather uneasy week after the S and B gathering at Macclesfield: when I told Maskarade that I would be blogging his Bank Holiday special, he chortled and told me with, … Read more >>
Independent Crossword 9188 by Monk (26-03-2016)
The last paper copy of the Independent – but not the last puzzle. And one of my favourite setters as the sun finally sets on the printed paper. If you don’t know already you … Read more >>
Independent 9,193 by Phi
Well I can see that today is April Fool’s Day, a day on which there is not much point in reading the newspapers since all the writers will be vying with each other to find the most amusing non-story. …
Guardian 26,847 / Imogen
I approached this puzzle rather nervously, in view of the date, as Imogen puzzles can be tricky at the best of times. As it turned out, there was no hidden trickery, unless it’s … Read more >>
Financial Times 15,203 by SLEUTH
Fun crossword today from Sleuth. Made rapid progress thanks to clean unambiguous cluing. Busy day up ahead so unfortunately dont have time to do justice in the preamble.
Financial Times 15,202 by MUDD
I’m not sure if I enjoyed solving this or not…
Guardian Cryptic 26,846 by Paul
Lots of fun and not too tricky
Independent 9192 / Hoskins
We found the top half of this puzzle much easier than the bottom. This wasn’t helped by us entering DRAGOON for 30ac. Yes, we knew we couldn’t parse it but we thought … Read more >>