Whew!! Actually, the first Playfair was not too bad, as a code phrase that long tends to lead to a bunch of letters left over that, as long as one or two of them appear in the hints, help a lot. I...
Nice and straightforward. I felt we could have been left to work out for ourselves which entry was reversed, and I wasn't too keen on the cryptic clues to the second line, but it's always good to be...
I thought things were going well until I ground to a halt in the top right corner -- even having the theme identified didn't help me much. Finally got there, though. I hadn't come across the poem...
That was quite a workout! Unlike several recent Listeners where an early guess at the theme helped a lot with the gridfill, this time I could not tackle the endgame until I had worked my way through...
Very satisfying. Some very good clues with some neatly hidden misprints. I'd forgotten that quotation, and was delighted to be reminded of it. Early on I thought there was going to be an ambiguity,...
That was fun -- quite a quick solve, but I liked the idea. The one slight niggle I have is that the literal spling has not been 100% carried out -- unless I've made mistakes in at least two entries....
This was real fun. I'd have struggled with the objects without Google (I understand that other search engines are available). The clues were generally fairly straightforward, though I was held up for...
Had a lucky start because a few of my early solves contained relatively uncommon letters, so the grid-fill could start quickly. Nice clues, with a nice balance of easy and tricky. Once I had the full...
I thought I might be in for a bit of grid-staring, but the penny dropped after about half an hour. The amount of thematic material and the construction of the messages is most impressive. A worthy...
I had to do a lot of cold solving before I could be sure which were the rogues, but once they were identified it all fell into place quite neatly. A few words to add to the vocabulary, too. Many...
Another pleasant puzzle, with unambiguous clues and a pretty, if straightforward, end-game. Thanks to Little Hare, both for the puzzle and for sending me back to the source of the message....
Nice straightforward clues, and a theme that never fails to raise a smile. Familiarity with the theme, guessed early, made is possible to see where some clashes were going to be before both...
Lovely puzzle by the Listener editors (Tiburon and Kea). Impressive to think these excerpts were published in the paper. I was thinking as I was solving it that I am still in need of a cryptic clue,...
That was good fun. I have to admit that I used the extra words to deduce the first six relevant entries, and only then sat down to work out what the husband and wife had been up to. I suppose it might...
A very satisfying puzzle this one, and thankfully easier to make inroads into than last week's. Everything fell into place quite quickly once I had enough answers to have a go at grid entry. I like...
That was a lot of fun. It took me longer than it should have to spot what was going on in the Group B clues, even though I had seen what the instruction told me to do elsewhere. Many thanks, Harpy,...