Constructor: Aimee Lucido and Ella Dershowitz
Relative difficulty: Easy-Challenging (all of the "Challenging" part came from the theme squares ... which is also where much of the "Easy" came from ... it was a ride)
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THEME: SPIN THE BOTTLE— the letters B, O, T, T, L, E appear clockwise in the grid, twice, inside the circled squares; in one position, the letters work for the Downs; in another position (rotated 180 degrees), the letters work for the Acrosses, i.e. you have to start BOTTLE at the top to get the Downs right, and you have to start it at the bottom to get the Acrosses. This means you have double-occupied circled squares, with the one that works for the Across making a plausible-looking (but wrong) ghost answer in the Down, and vice versa, each time. It's a lot:
Theme answers, starting from the top and going clockwise:
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I adore this idea, and I think it's impressively ambitious in its execution, but it's also a bit of a mess. Expressing "spinning" is hard, and as you can see by my theme description, this puzzle's version of "spinning" isn't easy to describe succinctly, though it's pretty straightforward in the end. BOTTLE works for Acrosses in one configuration, but you've got to "spin" it 180 degrees for it to work for the Downs. And yet you need both letters in the square, which creates chaos, though the chaos comes mainly while solving. I got SPIN THE BOTTLE pretty early, and figured out the spin concept as well, but I never saw exactly how much the BOTTLE had "spun" until I was done with the puzzle. I got the first BOTTLE configuration OK (with the "B" at the top), but as I was solving, I just couldn't get a handle on where the next BOTTLE sequence stopped and finished, or even if it was going in the same direction. So every single BOTTLE square was, in practice, uncrossed, i.e. I didn't have the aid of a crossing letter (which is kind of the heart and soul of cross-words), since the crossing letter was always different. I like that the "wrong" answers also make plausible crossword answers, although it doesn't add much to the puzzle, since a. you can tell the wrong answers are wrong, i.e. they're not fooling anyone, and b. because you have to put two letters in the square, you still have a gibberish-y looking grid. So it's like the elegance of having the "wrong" answers be plausible answers is kind of lost in madness. I appreciate it on an architectural level, but I'm not sure if it was necessary. Still, why not? I don't know if solvers are going to notice / appreciate it, but careful attention to detail is never bad, even if no one sees it. So, HOORAY for this theme even if actually solving (and describing!) it turned out to be a bit of a chore.
Relative difficulty: Easy-Challenging (all of the "Challenging" part came from the theme squares ... which is also where much of the "Easy" came from ... it was a ride)
Theme answers, starting from the top and going clockwise:
- GATOR / LUBES (with GABOR / LUTES as ghost answers)
- BLAST / CAMEO (with BOAST / CAMEL as ghost answers)
- SEEPS / TATER (with EATER / STEPS as ghost answers)
- CUBIT / LITRE (with CUT IT / LIBRE as ghost answers)
- DROOL / LASES (with DROLL / OASES as ghost answers)
The subject of a work contained in a resource, which is translated into controlled subject languages (e.g., classification schemes, subject headings lists); includes topical aspects and also genre and form. (librarianshipstudies.com)
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I am friends with many librarians and love them as a rule, but ABOUTNESS feels pretty, uh, niche-y. I don't dislike it, but the wikipedia page for it is so useless, so poorly written, that I had to look elsewhere for a solid definition related specifically to librarianness. This is why it seems pretty niche-y to me—having to go to a specialist website for a clearish definition. It's almost certainly the least heard-of thing in the grid (the only unheard-of thing, for me). It was ultimately inferrable, though ... as with the theme, my instinct is to love it, but I'm also kind of making a questioning face at it. Because it's very gettable, I think I'm pro. Certainly better than the average dreariness you might have had in its stead. Still, someone should clean up that wikipedia page.
The NW (i.e. the start) was my main trouble spot once again, as AWOL had no military indication in the clue (not faulting the clue, just explaining why AWOL didn't occur to me) (1A: Missing), and the clue on ASIA looked very specific but wasn't (17A: Home of Baikal, the world's deepest lake) (ASIA is big!), and that clue on LEAS(E) involved a massive direction using a word ("letter") that is both valid and never used by anyone in actual speech (4D: What a letter needs). What's the difference between a "letter" and a "lessor"??? Aha, turns out, zero. Zero is the difference. Car ads use "lessor" ... sigh, "letter," frowny face. Had STAS before STNS (60D: Listings on a train sched.), which is really the most awful kind of "mistake" you can make—a junky little piece of crosswordese, and you trip on it? Bah. I call my cat Olive "OLIVIA," so I like that answer (she has a tendency to DROOL (51A: Have a Pavlovian response), so more cat relevance there). I liked LOSE FACE and the "FAERIE Queene" spelling of FAERIE (22A: Mythical being, old-style). The grid is quite solid, especially given all the theme shenanigans. I did not have a bad time! Happy Thursday!
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld
P.S. please enjoy this Fire Safety Crossword Puzzle, sent to me by one of my readers. By "enjoy," I mean ... I don't know what I mean. I mostly just marvel at the construction and then imagine horribly wrong answers:
