Constructor: Peter A. Collins
Relative difficulty: Medium
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THEME: BOOMERANG EFFECT (36A: Unwelcome reversal ... or a title for this puzzle?) — four theme answers run Down and then boomerang back up (in the adjacent Down space); all said answers are things that, in some way, come back:
Theme answers:
Word of the Day: ANNA Karina (3D: Karina in may a Jean-Luc Godard film) —
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Seems very solid. I've seen many different puzzles that involve some kind of reverse-entry of answers, but this one is remarkably tight, especially considering that two of the theme answers symmetrically cross the central revealer. Nice construction / dumb luck. Puzzle played pretty easily for me, with the only significant resistance coming in the largish rectangle of answers in the center-east. PAGE-A was a mystery to me. Had -AGE- and couldn't think of anything. WORD-A-day calendars are things that sound familiar to me. But the 365-page calendar is not something I'd call a PAGE-A-day calendar (though I don't doubt it's a calendar type). Anyway, that answer, and PIEHOLE for [Trap] and ARTICLE for [45A: What the Beatles had but Wings didn't?] and ONE B.C. for [End of an era?] (!?) and LOCAL for [What pulls out all the stops?] all gave me fits. Three of those are "?" clues, so no surprise there, I guess. The LOCAL stops at all the stops ... so I'm not sure how "pulls out" is being imagined in that clue. "Pulls out" as in "produces"? As in "watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat"? ("Again?").
No time for extensive commentary tonight. The World Series calls. My first [Paella ingredient] was CORN. Had Square ONE before Square PEG, and LORD beforeDEAR (2D: Prayer starter, often), and LIE before FIB (57D: Small story). No trouble with TITI (54D: New World monkey). You know you do a lot of crossword puzzles when *that* clue is a gimme. My Google News search turned up many instances of FLOUTER, but they were all from French articles. Don't suppose that word actually gets used a lot in English. Oh, well, they can't all be gold. There really aren't that many clunkers today.
Relative difficulty: Medium
THEME: BOOMERANG EFFECT (36A: Unwelcome reversal ... or a title for this puzzle?) — four theme answers run Down and then boomerang back up (in the adjacent Down space); all said answers are things that, in some way, come back:
Theme answers:
- 5D: With 6-Down, mutual relationship (TWO-WAY / STREET)
- 9D: With 10-Down, critical comments (NEGATIVE / FEEDBACK)
- 37D: With 38-Down one who may give you a lift (ELEVATOR / OPERATOR)
- 46D: With 47-Down means of getting home, maybe (RETURN / TICKET)
Word of the Day: ANNA Karina (3D: Karina in may a Jean-Luc Godard film) —
Anna Karina (born Hanne Karin Bayer; 22 September 1940) is a Danish, now French citizen, film actress, director, andscreenwriter who has spent most of her working life in France. She is known as a muse of the director Jean-Luc Godard, one of the pioneers of the French New Wave. Her notable collaborations with Godard include The Little Soldier (1960), A Woman Is a Woman (1961), Vivre sa vie (1962), and Alphaville (1965). With A Woman Is a Woman, Karina won the Best Actress award at the Berlin Film Festival. (wikipedia)
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No time for extensive commentary tonight. The World Series calls. My first [Paella ingredient] was CORN. Had Square ONE before Square PEG, and LORD beforeDEAR (2D: Prayer starter, often), and LIE before FIB (57D: Small story). No trouble with TITI (54D: New World monkey). You know you do a lot of crossword puzzles when *that* clue is a gimme. My Google News search turned up many instances of FLOUTER, but they were all from French articles. Don't suppose that word actually gets used a lot in English. Oh, well, they can't all be gold. There really aren't that many clunkers today.