Friday, 23 December 2022

BEQ: Here’s the Kicker by Brendan Emmett Quigley. .puz, .pdf, online.
The Chicago Maroon: 52. 2022 MCPT #2: Clove is in the Air by Pravan Chakravarthy. .pdf, online.
Crosshare Community: Daily Mini and Featured Puzzles.
Crossword Nexus Blog: Puzzle #72: Can We Talk? (feat ???) by Alex Boisvert .jpz, .pdf, online.

Autostraddle: Autostraddle Mini — December 23, 2022 by Brooke Husic. .pdf, online.
Crossword Club: Daily Crossword: December 23, 2022 by Kelsey Dixon. .pdf, online.
Crucinova: ($) Alphabits by Lisa Bunker. Subscribe at link.
Inkubator: ($) Holding Pattern by Joanne Sullivan. Subscribe at link.
Planet Crossword: Sweet Talking by Carly Schuna. Online.

The Atlantic Mini: by Paolo Pasco. .pdf, online.
Crosswords with Friends: by Andy Kravis. App Store | Google Play
Daily POP Crosswords: by Matthew Stock. App Store | Google Playonline.
Los Angeles Times: by Lewis Rothlein. Online, pdf. Free Cruciverb account for .puz.
LA Times Mini: by Elizabeth Gorski. Online.
The Modern Crossword: Friday, December 23, 2022 by Anna Gundlach. Online, .pdf.
New York Sun: ($) Warrior by Bob Peoples. Reissues from 2003.
New York Times: ($) by Brandon Koppy. Online, .pdf, app.
New York Times Mini: by Joel Fagliano. Online, app.
The New Yorker: The Holiday Crossword: Friday, December 23, 2022 by Erik Agard. .pdf, online.
Newsday: Timely Message by Stanley Newman. Online, .pdfbackup online.
Universal: Downtime by Michael Berg. Online, pdf. .puz.
USA Today: Split Ends by Li Ding. Online, .pdf, app.
Vox: by Andrew J. Ries. .pdf, online.
Vulture 10×10: The Buddy Puzzle by Stella Zawistowski. .pdf, online.
The Wall Street Journal: Jolly Old St. Nick by Mike Shenk. Online, .pdf. .puz.
Washington Post Daily Mini Meta: by Andrew White & Pete Muller. Online, .pdf.

Darren’s Puzzles: Cryptic Tree 2022-12 by Darren Miller. .pdf
Mental Playground: December 23 by MP. .pdf, online.
Out Of Left Field: ($) Cryptic #143 by Joshua Kosman & Henri Picciotto. Patreon subscription.
Puzzles For Progress: #99: Morseword, Tatamibari, Yajilin by Jacob Cohen. .pdf, .puz, online.
Real Puzzling Stuff: Slide + Seek #5 by Ryan Patrick Smith. .pdf, online.
Square Pursuit: Eight Cryptic Nights #5 – Shin by Steve Mossberg. .pdf, online.
Some Variety: Advent 2022: #19 by Elgel online.
Some Variety: Advent 2022: #18 by Elgel online.

Financial Times: FT Weekend Magazine Crossword Number 620 by Aldhelm. .pdf.
Financial Times: FT Crossword: Number 17,285 by Gaff. .pdf.
The Globe and Mail: The Daily Cryptic Crossword. .pdf, online.
The Guardian: Cryptic crossword No 28,948 by Brendan. .pdf, online.
The Independent: Cryptic Crossword by Filbert. .pdf, online.

Other American-style crosswords:

Reviews and Discussion at Diary of a Crossword Fiend | Boatload Puzzles/AARP | Crosshare | CrosswordsBackwards | Cruciverbalista (en español) | Dictionaries6 | Easy Crossword | FreeDailyCrosswords | GameLab | Hard Crossword | r/crossword | Squares.io | YourPuzzleSource | XWord-Muggles Meta Calendar

Other Cryptic/Variety crosswords:

A Frame Games | cf.kmbweb.de Links Library | Harper’s ($) | Lovatts | Magpie ($) | Mokelfish Links Library | MyCrossword | NPL | Panda Magazine ($) | Private Eye | PuzzleCrypt archives | Puzzling StackExchange | r/crosswords | Split Decisions | Sydney Morning Herald ($) | The Telegraph | The Times (UK) ($), includes The Listener

Crossworld News and Notes: December

A little straightforward this time, but it’s news all the same.

We’d previously noted Lisa Bunker’s announcement of Crucinova‘s wind-down, and are thrilled to instead see the innovative venture continue under new editorship, as Lisa has announced Quiara Vasquez will take the helm with behind-the-scenes assistance from Gavin Byrnes. In an email to subscribers, Lisa shared, “I am deeply impressed by Quiara’s constructing and editing chops, and excited to see where she takes the site.”

Quiara has already begun her work at Crucinova, including constructing this week’s puzzle. Our congratulations and gratitude to her for taking this on.
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It’s Puzzle Mania season from The New York Times – this Sunday’s (12/18) paper will include a special print-edition-only puzzle-themed bonus section in what has become an annual tradition for puzzle lovers. In the NYT Games team’s weekly email newsletter, Sam Ezersky shared that this year’s Super Mega was constructed by Joel Fagliano and is “the largest crossword you’ll ever see.” (Frank Longo might have something to say about that, Sam.)

The Puzzle Mania section will be in all Sunday editions of the paper, for both print subscribers and at newsstands. If you’re unable to locate a copy, some will be available beginning Monday from the Times online store.
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From Hayley Gold: Calling all cryptic lovers and the crypt-curious: Me, Al Sanders and Will Nediger will be doing a special holiday cryptic stream on Friday December 16 at 9 pm eastern at www.twitch.tv/bewilderingly. We’ll be featuring an all new puzzle by NPL legend Kevin Wald, and wait there’s more— Kevin will be with us! Plus, 2nd special guest Steve Mossberg, whose upcoming 8-night Hanukkah cryptic suite is bound to be a real latke-fest. Plus more variety cryptics full of season’s solvings! 
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Pretend I figured out how to embed this tweet from Erik Agard. Erik is sharing two 13×13 puzzles with folks who donate to a GoFundMe for Khorry Ramey, whose father Kevin Johnson was killed by lethal injection in Missouri in late November. I (Matt) encourage you to read some of the news coverage Kevin, Khorry, and the barbarism of our state from that time. It’s easy to look away but I hope you won’t.

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Keep an eye out for ACPT 2023 Registration, expected to open around the first of the year. Room block information for the Marriott will be available then, as well. We hope to see you there!

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Bacon (Erdős?) Numbers for crosswords? Bacon (Erdős?) Numbers for crosswords. And who else to name it after than Nancy Salomon, one of the great crossword mentors and collaborators of the 90s and 00s? In the New York Times alone, 116 of Nancy’s 186 puzzles between 1995 and 2012 were collaborations. After the original idea from Quiara here, Alex Boisvert is on the case, with help from Saul Pwanson’s data set, which you might know from a certain past plagiarism scandal.

An initial tool to determine Salomon numbers is available at The Wisdom of Salomon (the DCL team are all at 4, currently), and Alex shared initial analysis at the Nexus Blog. Excited to see where this goes!

Crossworld News and Notes, September 2022

Don’t forget, we’re moving! For now we are still simulcasting via Substack and WordPress, but we will soon transition to only WordPress. Make sure you’re subscribed to the new site:

And we’re growing! We’ve added pages for Construction Resources and our entire list of puzzle sources. We also want to hear from you – is there a feature you want to see? Have an idea to pitch, a guest essay to submit, or a tip about some exciting puzzle news? Something else? Let us know!

We’re very happy to share our first essay, “On Trust,” by Will Eisenberg, exploring the relationship between a constructor and solver. A snippet: “A puzzlemaker can strive to evoke many things: happiness, nostalgia, the feeling of being ‘seen,’ the joy of an “aha!” moment, and even frustration. But the ability to evoke these emotions from the solver is built upon a base of trust. This is because a puzzle offers the solver one fundamental proposition: It is going to take you some time to work out the solution, but it will be worth it.”

We’re excited to add a home for guest essays here on our new site, and will build out public submission guidelines in time.


Congratulations to Kelsey Dixon, whose puzzle was chosen from an open call to round out the Boswords Fall Themeless League. She joins Derek Allen, Kate Chin Park & Chandi Deitmer, Malaika Handa, Natan Last, Barbara Lin, Portia Lundie, Brendan Emmett Quigley, and Brad Wilber. What a fantastic lineup! Registration is open now, and the League starts with the preseason puzzle on September 26.

New to Boswords? Check out the introductory video from organizer John Lieb:

Registration is open now for The Tenth Annual Finger Lakes Crossword Competition on September 24. After a Zoom-based kick off event moderated by Anna Shechtman, the puzzles are presented in a laid-back, self-timed, all-pdf format. The event is open to individuals and teams of up to four people with three levels of difficulty. The fee is pay-what-you-want and proceeds support adult literacy programs in the Finger Lakes area.

Final reminder that the Lollapuzzoola 15 puzzles are available for purchase through September 24. There’s so much good content here; get it while you still can!


My Jewish Learning, a site with resources to empower Jewish discovery for anyone interested in learning more, has launched a weekly Jewish themed mini crossword puzzle written by Rebecca Goldstein. They will also run larger Jewish holiday-themed puzzles throughout the year.

The first edition of Lemonade Disco has arrived! The theme of the 5-puzzle pack hosted on Taylor Made Crosswords is “Cocktail Mixer” and includes puzzles by Matt Forest, Emma Getman, George Ho, Seth Bisen-Hersh, and Glenn Cook. Puzzles are curated and edited by Taylor Johnson with help on this edition from guest editor Steve Mossberg. Constructors of any experience level may participate. Submissions for the third edition, “Rising Signs” are due on October 17. Submissions details here.

Crucinova has announced it will be drawing to a close by June 2023. We’ve enjoyed many of the innovative puzzles that Crucinova has made possible and we thank Lisa Bunker and all of the constructors for their work.


A hearty welcome back to Cursewords Live! After an extended summer hiatus, Parker Higgins and Ross Trudeau will be live solving and live creating puzzles once more starting tonight (September 18) at 8pm eastern.


AVCX Cryptics has re-opened for submissions during the month of September. Details here.

The Inkubator is open for submissions for the month of September for themed puzzles from women and nonbinary constructors. Details here.

Congratulations to Katie Hale, who has joined the L.A. Times team as Assistant Editor.


Since the last News & Notes, Adam Simpson (9/5) and Ekua Ewool (9/7) made their NYT debuts and Bonnie Eisenman (9/12) made her USAT debut! Congrats to everyone!


Hayley Gold, along with Will Nediger and Al Sanders, have issued a contest to write a full set of new cryptic clues for the grid “Un-American” by Stephen Sondheim. The filled grid is here and the original puzzle and clues are here. Submit contest entries to Hayley via Twitter dm. Hayley, Will, and Al are co-streaming cryptics on Will’s Twitch channel; next streams are October 6 and October 21 at 9pm eastern.

Hayley also wrote a in-depth rundown of Lollapuzzoola 15 for Beyond Wordplay and she was a guest on the podcast “Because Language” to discuss the state and history of cryptic crosswords and crossworld in general.


Champion speed solver Stella Zawistowski recently appeared on the YouTube show “Game On,” in which she raced viewers to solve a series of crosswords.


Thanks in preparing this issue to: Kate Chin Park, Hayley Gold, Rebecca Goldstein, and Taylor Johnson.

Have a news tip for us? An idea to pitch? A puzzle or puzzle site to share? Let us know!