Toss in the fact that the theme entries in the grid form a haiku and that the puzzle instructions were in haiku and you have a theme executed deftly at every turn. The 11th syllable in each haiku phonetically tells solvers to write their own haikus as part of the entry submission process. The screen shot doesn’t really do the Orca winner for Best Meta/Contest crossword justice, for the beauty of this puzzle is in the 72 clues that form 24 haikus (haikues? haikueues?). “Ode to Crosswords” by Matt Gaffney (MGWCC #356, March 27). To have all that turning stacked like it is in every case with fresh, playful crossings is just amazing. Oh, and the neighboring Downs would be forgiven if they were lackluster since they too consist of stacked theme material–and yet there’s stuff like THE LEFT, DRESS UP, SEXTS, A AND E, BIOLABS, and DIE DOWN. And what I love most is that the six Downs that really crawl up also work as legitimate Downs by themselves. Regardless, this puzzle just brings it when it comes to theme execution. One wonders if this started as a Thursday puzzle with UPSIDES as a revealer in the middle but turned into a Sunday puzzle when the 15×15 grid proved too restrictive. But this took the turning cake, so to speak, as 24(!) entries along the left and right edges took a 90-degree turn, making it so all of them at some point went “up the sides” of the puzzle (hence the title).
An unusually high number of puzzles had theme answer taking turns in the grid (recall the origami puzzle discussed yesterday). If 2014 was the year of the Schrodinger puzzle, 2015 might have been the year of the turning puzzle. “Upsides” by Jeremy Newton (New York Times, March 22). And yet it didn’t even win the Reagle Award! That honor went to… This puzzle gets more marvelous every time you look at it and think about the serious chops required in the construction. The GOES UP AND DOWN revealer almost looks like an afterthought, yet it makes sure every section of the grid is occupied with thematic material. So all Patrick had to do was find hidden words in interesting words and phrases that would be appropriate starts to “up” and “down” that could stack upon each other in symmetrical locations throughout the grid. So, as you can see in the screen shot to the right, the END in TENDERHEARTED shifted up (“end up”) while the LIE in SALIERI shifted down (“lie down”). One of the nominees for the Merl Reagle Award for Best Sunday-sized Crossword, this Patrick Berry offering was the one where hidden words in the theme entries shifted up or down a row, as appropriate to the clue. “Flip-Flops” by Patrick Berry (New York Times, February 22). So let’s get to this year’s nominees, listed (as always) in order of publication date: 2014: “ Repeat Offenders,” by Francis Heaney (MGWCC #330).2013: Untitled, by Patrick Blindauer (New York Times) (the “double feature” puzzle).2012: Untitled, by Ben Tausig (Onion AV Club) (the “up-down” puzzle).2011: “ Moving Day,” by Matt Gaffney (MGWCC #169).Today’s winner joins an illustrious group of puzzles that have earned Best Crossword honors: From this deep pool come eight fantastic, beloved puzzles–this year’s Best Crossword nominees. As we observed yesterday, more than 1,800 puzzles were reviewed on this site, and there are hundreds more quality puzzles that don’t get regular love here (see the Fireball Newsflash crossword and the various indie crossword offerings of Andy Kravis, Erik Agard, Chris King, Kameron Austin Collins, Tim Croce, Todd McClary, and Sam Ezersky, to name a few). Through happy and sad, however, there continued to be one constant: the crossword puzzle. I’m not sure any of us can recall a single year in which so many from our happy tribe left us. And our fearless leader got a new kidney!īut 2015 was also a year of incredible loss, with the deaths of constructors Merl Reagle and Henry Hook, editor Leslie Billig, top solver Doug Hoylman, and fellow puzzle-head Tom Gazzola. The Indie 500 Tournament was a smashing success in its inaugural year. On the happy side, we saw two daily puzzles launch, one at the Wall Street Journal and another on BuzzFeed (though sadly, the latter no longer runs five days a week).
Will one of these puzzles win Best Crossword? Click “Continue reading” to find out!Ģ015 was a memorable year in crosswords, for reasons good and bad. Margaret Farrar Constructor of the Year Award, Patrick Berry.Bob Klahn Award for Best Clue, Peter Gordon.
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