Monday 27 July 2015

A new crostic, this time from a short story in an anthology, Hear Me Roar.



I was quite pleased with this one. It is not very hard. Does anyone want harder onesI am at mcardle@ozemail.com.au

Thursday 23 July 2015




Solutions for the previous puzzle!

A) Old Wine Shades
B) Rocket
C) Shy
D) Once
E) Ninth
F) Stand
G) Collar
H) Och
I) The Winds of Change
J)The Queen of air and darkness
K) Chrysalis
L) ant
M) Robotech
N) dawn
O) End
P) nook
Q) Decal
R) Eph
S) retch
T) Saint in London
U) Girth
V) arc
W) Mastiff
X) EBH

The first letters of which spell: Orson Scott Card, Ender's Game.

(Which I am not surprised didn't do too well as a film, because in the book you didn't know what was going on!)

Monday 20 July 2015

Well, hoping I haven't posted this before...! I'm pretty sure I haven't.




Sorry! There are a couple of abbreviations!

Sunday 19 July 2015

For my tennis acrostic,

A) Postman always rings twice.
B) Andy Murray
C) Twelfth
D) Caroline Wozniacki
E) Ash
F) Roger Federer
G) ducts
H) itch
I) Garbine Muguruza
J) avoids
K) nosh
L) nights
M) OSS
N) touch tooth
O) Hearing of her beauty and her wit
P) It shoots
Q) notch
R) gumshoes
S) Parker Pyne Investigates
T) executes
U) Roth
V) Serena Williams
W) gosh
X) nth
Y) Ag
Z) Little Nemo in Slumberland.

First letters read: Pat Cardigan, Nothing Personal.

These puzzles are not all that difficult to make up, except for the last bit, where you have a few stray letters needing to be made into a word. Which I have difficulty with sometimes! And on this occasion Gosh had to be moved left!! Sob.

Sunday 12 July 2015

A  little bit early this week!
Also, this one is IMPERFECT! I thought I would do a special crostic for Wimbledon, (hoping I spelled names right!) and I had lots of Hs left, so I put them in the diagram. There are five players' names in it, including two with "Z" in their name. But I couldn't spot a passage with two Zs and a J - so, sorry Djoker!


Also, the crostic itself is imperfect. One of the first letters is out of place. I have sneaked the answer out of line, so the second letter is in line!
The piece is a short(ish) story from Gardner Dozois' Twenty-first Annual collection of Science Fiction stories. I have bought three of these now, so others may appear in this series of puzzles from time to time!

Saturday 11 July 2015

The solution to last week's puzzle!

A) bump
B) If we are marked to die
C) eg
D) gangway
E) lass
F) E
G) rug
H) focus
I) is
J) Neal Stephenson
K) dun
L) I
M) New Mutants
N)gum
O) NC
P) espy
Q) Where is the life that late I led
R) procrastination
S) a watched pot never boils
T) to a blind man
U) hug
V) was
W) Al Capp
X) yap
Y) Staffordshire bull terrier

and the first letters read: Biegler Finding new pathways.

It seems we sculpt new brain pathways well into adult life and maybe right up until stumps. The research has spawned a slew of brain training games popular among habitual carkey losers and others eager to fend off cognitive decrepitude.


Sunday 5 July 2015

Another new puzzle. I may get a bit slower, and post one every second week...

This one is based on an article from the Melbourne Sunday Age, just to be different!



These are jpg files, so they should be easy to download? Answers in a week or so.


Saturday 4 July 2015

The solution for last week's puzzle:

A) twitch
B) homeowner
C) ewe
D) awoke
E) root
F) thumb
G) Oh
H) Frankenstein Unbound
I) emote
J) Featuring the Saint
K) frown
L) Eh
M) careworn
N) theme
O) IH
P) vouch
Q) E
R) doth
S) redeem
T) E
U) Ag
V) Moon is a harsh mistress
W) I
X) North Dakota
Y) Gillian Polack

The first letters read: The Art of Effective Dreaming, which by coincidence is by answer Y) Gillian Polack.