Sharing another challenging themeless puzzle before I get swept into the swing of the spring semester next week. This one started with the spanner at 36-Across, followed by the top-right and bottom-left corners, and then the main diagonal sections fell into place later. I can also declare that this one has ZERO golf content, in case that's been bothering you about my recent puzzles (sorry, I'm building a wordlist). Instead, there's lots of music references (especially Scottish bands, for some reason) and a bit of mathematics. And you should definitely check out 36-Down's lovely flowers on Instagram! Enjoy the solve, and share if you do! puz pdf fullscreen solution

Happy holidays! The season inspired a few entries in this grid, like 15-Across and 63-Across, but there's plenty of other fun stuff, including some recurring motifs in the clues. The word count and grid shape might make this one play a little more easily than usual (lots of 3s), but I'm calling it "hard" just in case. Enjoy the solve, and share if you do! puz pdf fullscreen solution

This little puzzle was inspired by 11-Across. The local tie-in with 16-Across was a nice bonus. Hope this plays fun and fairly easy for ya. In other news, today (Friday, June 17) is Bandcamp's Juneteenth fundraiser : "from midnight to midnight Pacific Time, [..] we donate 100% of our share of sales to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund to support their ongoing efforts to promote racial justice through litigation, advocacy, and public education." Please consider purchasing some music today to directly support artists and good causes! I could make lots of recommendations, but here are some ideas if you're looking for jazz  or  indie rock  or  beat tapes  or folk or  art rap  or  funky soul  or  acoustic guitar  or ... Enjoy the solve and the music, and share if you do! Constructive feedback in the comments is always welcome. Download links:   [ puz ]   [ pdf ]   [ solution ]        Direct...

Just a small, rhymey puzzle this week. Hope this one is fun and easy-breezy. You might even pick up a few music suggestions from the clues 😄 Enjoy the solve, and share if you do! Constructive feedback in the comments is always welcome. Download links:   [ puz ]   [ pdf ]   [ solution ]        Direct link: [ open in new tab ]

I hope you enjoy this silly puzzle! It all started when I was listening to a song by 26-Across and thought, "There's gotta  be a way I could use this name." After 34-Across came to mind, it was only a matter of figuring out how to fit everything into a grid, and I somehow ended up with this wide, short, mirror-symmetric oddity. Some of the corners and pockets may play like a tough themeless, but I hope the puzzle being "lightly themed"  overall will help you assemble everything together. I think this puzzle is a good example of something that could only ever appear on a crossword blog. Where else are you going to see a theme set consisting of just a 25 and a 15? (Speaking of which, I think the only possible connection I could make to the current holiday season is that one of the theme entries here is 25 letters long, and there's a holiday on the 25th this month. There's no special reason to run this puzzle this week; it's just what I happen to have r...

I have been working on variations of this theme for a while and I think something like this could work as a full-size puzzle, but this is the best I have so far. Let me know if you have similar ideas and want to discuss! (In particular, I wonder if something involving the  Four Tops might work...) This is also a funny grid with theme answers in the long downs crossing a central revealer, and with non-theme answers of the same length sandwiching that revealer. Perhaps not the best layout, in general, but I think it works out alright for this puzzle. And I hope you enjoy some of the bonus fill, including those central non-themers and the 7s in the top-right/bottom-left corners. In other news, I made my print puzzle debut* with the Universal crossword this past Saturday 11/13! (The puzzles are only available online for a couple of weeks afterwards so I can't link to it anymore. And to be honest, I didn't even get to see it in print myself until a couple weeks later because I assu...

Happy Halloween! 🎃🎸👻🥁🦇🎵💀🎹 I thought it might be fun to celebrate with a concert, so this puzzle's theme entries are all appropriately-named bands who are putting on a Halloween show for you. I'm sure something like this has been done before, so rather than scouring lists of relevant band names, I stuck to whatever came to my mind from the bands that I know of. Sure, not all of them are widely known (and at least one of them is really obscure, although that one's my favorite of the bunch by far), but I think I put enough hints in the clues that you'll be able to suss everything out. You'll notice several other answers and clues pertaining to music, as well, to go along with the main theme. In other news, the most recent Sunday puzzle (10/24) over at The Atlantic is mine! Check it out on their site where it will be available for the next week only. (I believe it disappears two weeks after publication date, unless you have an Atlantic  subscription.) Although...

  More experimentation with mirror symmetry! This is also my way of working on making stacks  in themeless puzzles. I still don't feel adept enough at gridding or wordlist-managing to make a consistently solid, full-sized themeless grid, so these midi-sized puzzles are one way I'm working on those skills. Anyway, I think this one has some interesting spanners and a few fun clues, too. Enjoy the solve, and share if you do! Constructive feedback in the comments is always welcome. Download links:   [ puz ]   [ pdf ]   [ solution ]        Direct link: [ play online ]

  Special bonus puzzle this week! I already have a post staged for tomorrow (Friday) morning, as usual. But, I was reading an article earlier today and realized that a lot of relevant words match lengths and...  well, a couple hours later, this puzzle was the result. Whether or not you know the theme answers, I'm hoping you'll enjoy the puzzle and find it smooth-sailing, overall. (And if this one is fun, perhaps I'll share similar puzzles like this in the future, making this one of a series...) When you're done, you can find the article I was reading SPOILER ALERT!!! 👉  here . Enjoy the solve, and share if you do! Constructive feedback in the comments is always welcome. Download links:   [ puz ]   [ pdf ]   [ solution ]        Direct link: [ play online ]

  Sound the chimes, it's time for rhymes!  I had already thought of three of these rhymes before realizing there's an extra thematic element to them. Then, the fourth entry came to mind and I realized it fit that theme, too! I don't know if I'll ever be able to make another rhyme time + extra theme puzzle, so I hope you really enjoy this one. Perhaps the extra thematic element will give you some hints and help you solve the puzzle. In any event, I realize there's a lot of names in this puzzle (by necessity, at times), so I'm struggling with deciding on a difficulty level. I've decided to call it hard difficulty  overall, but I also eased up the clues for some proper nouns via wordplay hints (especially in the bottom-right corner, where constructing stalled a bit). I hope this makes the puzzle more feasible and interesting for y'all. Enjoy the solve, and share if you do! Constructive feedback in the comments is always welcome. Download links:   [ puz ]  ...

One thing I mentioned in my intro post on this blog  is that I made crosswords with indie rock themes for a music blog back in the day (10ish years ago). Lately, I've been looking through those old puzzles, as well as the digital equivalent of scraps of paper with theme ideas scribbled on them. Today, I took one of those ideas and turned it into a proper puzzle! I doubt this puzzle would work at any crossword publication: the theme is a little loose, and the band names that form that theme are not all widely known. Still, I'm working on making better fill and clues these days, and I think this puzzle will give you a fun, reasonable challenge. Enjoy the solve, and share if you do! Constructive feedback in the comments is always welcome. Download links:   [ puz ]   [ pdf ]   [ solution ]

I'm starting a crossword blog, and this is it! Here's a quick summary of my crossword journey to this point: I've enjoyed puzzles of all kinds since childhood: logic games, crosswords, Scrabble, brainteasers, trivia, etc. I started playing competitive Scrabble tournaments in college and kept that up for a few years, but haven't played in a while. In grad school, friends and I would solve the New York Times  crossword together daily, and I starting exploring the indie puzzle-verse, as well. I made a bunch of crosswords just for fun, but didn't really share them beyond my circle of friends. I also made some crosswords with indie music themes to share on a website I was working for about the local music scene. (If you lived in Pittsburgh around 2010-2012 and remember the  Draw Us Lines blog, let me know!) After that, I got caught up with finishing grad school and entering academia. I would still solve puzzles for fun, but not as often as before. I started making some ...