NYS 4:37
LAT 3:43
CS 3:26
NYT 3:20
Wow, Steven Leckart's Cool Tools recommendation of my book really goosed the book's sales at Amazon today. How to Conquer the New York Times Crossword Puzzle climbed up to become the second best selling title in the Crosswords category. (Curse you, People Puzzler, for hogging #1!)
Matt Ginsberg gets a little possessive in his New York Sun crossword, "Hey! That's Mine!" The 10 theme entries aren't labeled as such, but they're essentially fill-in-the-blank clues that are missing the "___'s" part—[Web] is CHARLOTTE, as in Charlotte's Web, and [Ark] clues NOAH, for example. The possessive phrases included run the gamut from pop culture (GILLIGAN's Island, PRIZZI's Honor, and more) to geography (MARTHA's Vineyard) to literature (UNCLE TOM's Cabin and other books) to business (VICTORIA's Secret) to anatomy (ADAM's apple). I do like names in crosswords, and this puzzle's got a slew of names both in and out of the theme. Good fun!
Robert Dillman's New York Times has a theme that is entirely out of sync with my interests. [Call in roulette], [Call in blackjack], [Call in many a betting game], [Call in draw poker], and [Call in craps]? I say "bleah" to all five! The answer phrases are fresh enough, I suppose (well, FOURTEEN RED doesn't make my cruciverbal heart go pit-a-pat), but most of theme didn't leap into the forefront of my mind when I read the clues. "Hit me," yes, but HIT ME AGAIN, less so. I have grumbled before about poker themes, but I will now expand my Meh List to include craps, blackjack, and roulette themes.
Updated:
Rich Norris's CrosSynergy puzzle, "Rated PG," features six 8- to 10-letter theme entries with a PG in the middle. Favorite of those: LIP GLOSS, a [Cosmetic that may be flavored]. How well I remember junior high and Bonne Bell Lip Smackers and their other super-sticky lip gloss, available in flavors like watermelon, strawberry, and root beer. (Ew.) And [Chicago pro] is CUB—ah, the Cubbies. They'll lose in the first round of the playoffs, I reckon. They like to do just well enough to get long-suffering fans' hopes up, and then they dash those hopes. Hakuna matata, baby. Hakuna matata. Hate, hate, hate one clue/answer combo here: [Sorority members] for COEDS. If you simply can't fill your grid without the noun COEDS, for Pete's sake, why not clue it as an [Outmoded term for college women]? Actually, that's incorrect. It's not outmoded at all. Heavens, no. If you Google "coeds," you'll find more hardcore porn sites than you can shake a stick at. That's how the word's being used today. So let's look at the case for COEDS: It's a pre-feminist term that marginalizes women in college, and it's popular in porn? This word hates women. Constructors and editors, please keep it out of my crossword puzzles, or clue it in a way that shows you're not (a) living in the 1950s or (b) really into porn. Please.
As it turns out, it would have been pretty easy to get COEDS out of this puzzle and avoid my wrath. Change POP to ALP, OKED to OKRA, and FOPS to FOOT, thereby substituting AERO for PEEP and CLEAT for COEDS, et voilà.
Thomas Heilman's LA Times crossword works out the mental muscles with phrases that end with exercises: CYBERSQUATTING (for the legs and butt), NUMBER CRUNCHING (abs), and TONGUE TWISTING (obliques). I like the theme, but I love a lot of the fill. Three fictional names—CORLEONE, MR. SULU, and BANQUO. A dessert—TIRAMISU. Mississippi's state tree, the MAGNOLIA. Writer Margaret ATWOOD. That's great stuff, all of it. My favorite clue: [Cultured fare] for YOGURT (I wanted it to be some sort of ART, but no).
October 02, 2007
Wednesday, 10/3
August 13, 2007
Cartoons and crosswords
Have you seen the latest Pixar animated film, Ratatouille? My family and I all loved it. Funny, sweet, and with a heartening take-home message: "Anyone can cook." That was the motto of the late, great toon chef Auguste Gusteau and the title of his fictional cookbook. In the movie (and this is hardly a spoiler for anyone who's seen a single ad for Ratatouille), Remy is a rat who has a gift for cooking.
I think the same philosophy holds true for crossword puzzles. So many people say, "Oh, I can't do those things." They'll skim the list of clues for a crossword, see little that jumps out as something they know, and they'll put it down. But I do believe that anyone who has a modicum of intelligence and takes an interest in crosswords can learn how to kick cruciverbal butt. They may not all be able to triumph at the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament, but honestly, I think average Janes and Joes can teach themselves the tricks of the trade.
Of course, plenty of people just don't care about crosswords one way or another. But really, a tool like my book can help a new solver crack the code if he or she is motivated to try.
There are so many words and names that are woefully obscure to most Americans, but always on tap for crossword junkies. Sure, we all had a first time. We weren't born knowing that Charlie Chaplin married Eugene O'Neill's much-younger daughter, Oona (that name is the Irish version of her mom's name, Agnes). We didn't know that Uta Hagen taught acting. We didn't know that a seed coat is called an aril or that there's a group of arum plants. My book (like several others) includes lists of common words seen in crosswords. Study that vocabulary list and it won't much enhance your conversational skills, but it'll help you with crosswords.
Paying attention to the letter patterns of words is also helpful. If there's a longish answer lining the bottom or right side of a crossword grid, it probably contains the sort of letters that other words end with, for example. Like S and E and R and D.
Learning how to extract all the information from a clue is also key. Sometimes it's tricky and you can't tell if a noun like fish is plural or singular, or if a verb like put is in the past or present tense. But more often, it's obvious what part of speech the clue represents, and the answer will play the same role. Experienced solvers wil remember this convention, and it will help keep them from falling down the rabbit hole of dead-wrong answers.
The next lesson (a.k.a. book excerpt): The Top 10 Ways Constructors Try to Trick You.
August 12, 2007
Monday, 8/13
CS 4:12
NYS 4:08
NYT 2:48
LAT 2:46
(updated at 10:55 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. Monday)
If you're like me and you wish every book had not only a table of contents but also a finely crafted index, and you have a copy of How to Conquer the New York Times Crossword Puzzle, then feel free to click on this picture to enlarge it, print it out (it should print out in the right size even though it's huge on the screen, but not crystal-clear), and tuck it in the front of your book. (Thanks to Harris for the technical assistance. Unless it doesn't work, of course.)
I may be taking a short vacation and skipping blogging Monday and Tuesday nights, with Al Sanders and John Farmer filling in for me. However, my son's come down with an ill-timed fever, so we may not be going anywhere tomorrow after all. We'll have to reassess his status Monday morning.
The Monday New York Times puzzle is by Andrew Ries. His name is familiar to me—if this is the same Andrew Ries whose name I've seen during my years of editing pulmonary medicine papers and a crossword constructing debut, then congratulations to Dr. Ries. If it's a different guy but still a debut, then congratulations to Mr. Ries. If it's not a debut, then hey, I liked your puzzle, sir. The theme is fairly beefy for a Monday, with four long answers ending with SUN, STAR, POST, and TIMES, all of which can be a DAILY (5-Across) PAPER (72-Across).The fill contains a couple Xs and a Q for extra SPICE. However, what on earth is SEXY doing clued as [Like a Playmate of the Month]? Not everyone finds PhotoShopping and silicone to be sexy. How about a little equal access, e.g., [Like Brangelina]? If you don't like Brad, you might like Angelina. Today's old-school crossword fill: EWER, EDA LeShan, IVOR Novello, AGATE clued as a [Playing marble] (Does anyone still play marbles? Is anyone unfamiliar with the quartz variety called agate?), and the crossword direction ESE (not to be confused with the slang esé).
Updated:
The kid tossed and turned feverishly for hours—in Mom and Dad's bed. Ben awoke refreshed, but his folks are feeling plumb tuckered out. Sure, it's nothing compared with the sleep deprivation attendant on caring for a newborn, but we've grown soft since Ben's baby days and need our sleep.
Hooray! Another CrosSynergy crossword from Bob Klahn. In "Heart Association," the theme entries start with kinds of hearts: ARTIFICIAL, HEAVY, PURPLE, and BROKEN. As I'd expect from Klahn, many terrific clues: [They may get hot under the collar] for NAPES and [It holds its head up] for NECK; [What the Saints come marching in on?] for ARTIFICIAL TURF; [They're barely brown] for ECRUS (a good clue can redeem a lame word); [Result of many a union grievance?] for BROKEN MARRIAGE; [River whose name is Celtic for "river"] for AVON (did you know that? I didn't); [Prepare a dotted line, perhaps] for PERFORATE; and [Joint chief?] for WARDEN. Usually a theme like this would include straightforward clues for the theme entries, but here, two are tricky question-marked clues. EFILE (used here) and e-mail may be the only e- terms I hear people use. Other crosswords recently have given us the EDATE, EZINE, EMAG, ETAIL, and ENOTE, which I don't use (nor do I e-use them). What e-words do you use?
The theme in Fred Jackson III's LA Times puzzle is hard to label. Three-word phrases in which words 1 and 3 start with D and word 2 is short? He includes DULL AS DISHWATER, DEAR OLD DAD, DIME A DOZEN, and DOLLARS TO DONUTS. Dollars to donuts, I'll bet most dads wouldn't like to be tagged as dull or a dime a dozen—not that the crossword is thus slandering them or anything. AFROS is clued as [Big hairdos]; lately, I've been noticing more AFRO clues that reference the hairstyle itself rather than its purported outdatedness. Fros may have vanished in the '90s, but they're back now to a degree.
Update #2:
Jeremy Horwitz's New York Sun puzzle, "Mercury Records," features three songs I've never heard of ("COLD TURKEY," "COOL JERK," and "WARM IT UP") and one for which I have hardcore junior-high nostalgia. Foreigner's "HOT BLOODED" has dreadful lyrics, but hey, it fits the temperature/song continuum. (And no, Ben's fever did not evoke those lyrics because his fever maxed out at 102.9°.) Several standout clues: I like [Post-alpha bits?] for BETAS because it's clever and because I loved-loved-loved Alpha-Bits oaty orthographical breakfast cereal goodness when I was a kid. [It might be filled with pot smoke] is a fun mislead for KILN. The COFFEE BEAN is [Part of the morning grind?]. The Biblical-sounding ["Exodus" scribe] clues novelist Leon URIS. [Nickel and dime] means the COINS and not the adjective or verb. TALL can be defined as [Like Magic?] Johnson. Favorite fill: PB AND J, PAY PHONE, and the words containing those 10 instances of X, Z, J, or K.
March 27, 2007
Mercenary matters
All righty, my name's finally on the Amazon page for How to Conquer the New York Times Crossword Puzzle: Tips, Tricks and Techniques to Master America's Favorite Puzzle, so I've added a link in the sidebar.
The book's due to publish this July. I got my first look at the page proofs this past Saturday, and it looks rather like a book! (Well, if you ignore the giant white margins on every page.) I'm excited about it—agog, even!—and grateful to each and every person who's expressed interest in the book or extended their congratulations.
As a hired gun for St. Martin's Press, my remuneration comes in the form of a grant rather than royalties. However! I can earn a modest commission on copies bought via that handy little box near the top right of this page.
"Alas!" you may exclaim. "I've already pre-ordered my copy."
Fear not! You can always cancel your order and re-order the book through my site, thereby prompting Amazon to send some of its money to me. What could be easier?
P.S. Here's the tabletop poster St. Martin's had at Stamford:
