A few years ago Will Shortz (editor of the New York Times Crossword Puzzle) wrote an article in the New York Times titled “How to Solve the New York Times Crossword Puzzle.” It’s a very interesting — and potentially helpful — article for solvers of all crossword puzzles, of course.
You can access the article online here.
The New York Times crosswords are easiest on Mondays, and they get more difficult as the week progresses. Friday and Saturday are generally too difficult for new solvers, and quite a challenge for even more experienced crossword solvers.
When discussing a puzzle’s difficulty, it’s not uncommon for regulars to say, “It was about a Wednesday level puzzle …” for example. The day of the week has become a unit of measure (for difficulty) within the crossword community.
Of course, the Sunday puzzle doesn’t follow the weekday “grading” system. It’s much larger than the daily puzzles, but the difficulty level isn’t usually much greater than a Wednesday or Thursday puzzle.
And Friday/Saturday puzzles have something else in common with each other (in addition to being more challenging): they don’t have a theme. They are “themeless.” Not having a theme doesn’t make them more difficult per se, but it removes a kind of inside “hint” that you might otherwise use as a crutch when solving. (And it means that you don’t experience an “Aha!” moment when you discover what the theme entries have in common.)
Fridays and Saturdays — at least in the New York Times — are really for solvers who love the challenge of a tough crossword puzzle.
Weekends are heaven for serious crossword solvers. All the newspapers and syndicates come out with their best and biggest puzzles on the weekends. And, for the most part, they are not outrageously difficult.
I usually start with the Wall Street Journal puzzle that appears in the Friday paper. It’s edited by Mike Shenk, one of the best in the business. Then I move to the Washington Post and Los Angeles Times puzzles (edited by Fred Piscop and Rich Norris, respectively). I also make sure to find and solve Merl Reagle’s puzzle in the Philadelphia Inquirer. It’s syndicated and appears in many different papers, but the Philadelphia Inquirer is easiest to get online in AcrossLite format. (Note that access to the Los Angeles Times puzzle in AcrossLite format requires that you be registered on the Cruciverb website.)
All of these puzzles (and more) are easily accessible using Will Johnston’s Puzzle Pointers or the Cruciverb website. And all of them are in AcrossLite format, so once you’ve downloaded and installed AcrossLite, you can solve the puzzles on your computer or print them out and use the “old fashioned” approach with pencil/pen and paper. (See the link to Litsoft’s website where you can download AcrossLite.)
I didn’t mean to slight Will Shortz and the New York Times puzzles. I don’t miss a day of those — weekend or not. It’s just that those are only available by paid subscription, so they’re “different” in that regard. (And the Friday/Saturday puzzles are the most challenging of the week!) Subscription cost is $5.95 a month, or $34.95 for the year. Real crossword fanatics find that a very reasonable price for so many high-quality puzzles. Plus you get access to hundreds of great puzzles from prior years in the archive.
A lot of people saw the movie “Wordplay,” in which some famous folks, champion solvers, crossword constructors and Will Shortz (editor of the New York Times puzzles and creator/host of the annual American Crossword Puzzle Tournament) are featured solving and talking about the joys and rewards of crossword puzzle solving.
Movie reviews were pretty good overall, and crossword “crazies” probably enjoyed it more than others. (Having attended and competed in the tournament for several years now, I particularly liked seeing my crossword friends on the big screen!)
Since this blog is for SOLVERS, it’s probably not terribly relevant to tell you about Cruciverb.com, but I’ll do it anyway. Cruciverb is for constructors — the people who create crossword puzzles.
I actually enjoy the give-and-take and some features on Cruciverb, even though I have no interest in becoming a constructor. I mostly just lurk and follow the discussions that are of interest, ignoring a lot of the technical stuff.
The site was created by Kevin McCann, one of the nicest people you’ll ever meet, and it’s billed as the “Crossword Constructors Community Center.” You have to register to access much of the site. I’ve included a link at the right, just in case you want to check it out.
Will Johnston has assembled a great website that has pointers to a slew of high-quality crossword puzzles from major newspapers throughout the United States. It includes links to daily and weekly puzzles in The New York Times, USA Today, Washington Post, Philadelphia Inquirer, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, New York Sun, Wall Street Journal, and a couple of syndicates that supply other papers.
The site also has links to resources for crossword solvers, discussion forums, and other useful tools/references. It’s the best “one-stop shop” for crosswords on the net.
If you’re as addicted as I am, you’ll want to save this one as a “favorite.” It’s on the list of links at the right.
Lest you think there are not enough crossword addicts to fill a room, you need to know that there are 500 people who show up each year in March/April at the Stamford Marriott to participate in the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament, created and hosted by Will Shortz, the editor of the New York Times Crossword Puzzles.
The 30th annual tournament will be held March 23-25, 2007. If you can’t make it to Stamford CT that weekend, you can also participate online. Just click on the link to the tournament’s website and you’ll be able to get all the details there.
If you haven’t already discovered AcrossLite, it’s a must-have if you’re going to download and solve puzzles on your computer. It’s a simple, self-explanatory application that you can use immediately to solve crosswords on your computer or print them out to solve the old-fashioned way — with pen or pencil on paper. And it’s FREE too!
I’ve added a link at the right so you can go directly to the Litsoft site, where the download is readily available.
This blog is going to be the place for crossword “crazies” to share their passion with similarly afflicted addicts. There’s a common bond among people who spend a chunk of their spare time (and time when they should probably be doing other things) filling in letters in little boxes in order to spell interlocking words. This is going to become the meeting spot for those people.
We’ll talk about puzzles, reference lots of places on the web where you can find puzzles by the leading constructors, and suggest links to sites where more crossword discussion is going on 24/7. We’ll focus mostly on standard US-style crosswords — not cryptics or British-style puzzles — and we’ll keep the discussions and posts non-technical, just right for solvers at all levels.
Across and Down 