New York Times, Wednesday, December 18, 2013

The seed for this puzzle was 36-Across, clued as "Mime's mantra?" I recall that there may have been a fourth theme entry but it was weaker than what I thought were three solid entries. While I have often tried to fit in 4 or 5 good theme entries into a puzzle (sometimes successfully, sometimes not), in this case I felt that "less was more" and left things at three. I was very happy that it was accepted for publication, and didn't require any rewrites.

Ed Sessa lives on Sanibel island, Florida. We had the pleasure of meeting a year ago when I spoke at the local library. Today's puzzle by Ed is simple — just three theme entries — but they're all nice ones, and they make me smile.

Fun change-up today. Only three theme entries, but they're all good to great when re-imagined with one fewer space. AWAY WITH WORDS! was my favorite of the bunch.

A grid with just three theme entries has a great deal of potential for nice long fill, and Ed does s good job with that. Incorporating ESCAPE PLAN and I SMELL A RAT in the across direction adds to the level of difficulty, and a series of snazzy long downs enhanced my solving experience, EYELASH, SHOEBOX, and STALAG in particular. BOATEL was new to me, but a fun term.

I can't help but think that there were many other theme options, but I couldn't come up with any solid ones after a few minutes of thought. Since there were only three themers, it would have been really nice to have all three start with AW, but I couldn't come up with any common phrases that start with A WASH or A WRY. In this day and age where most puzzles have at least four theme answers, it's kind of nice to get a grid with three solid themers and a grid packed with additional good fill.

Sometimes people talk about the first impression a puzzle makes, at 1-across. For a while I didn't buy that (especially because I often couldn't figure out 1-across right away unless it was a Monday puzzle), but I'm starting to see the logic. Just like in public speaking or essays, the first and last impression is often a critical factor in the impression left with the audience. In this case, BUBBA is a great opener and affected my opinion to the positive. The REEDY / DRESSAGE finish was nice too.

Not to say it's all perfect — I'd love for SERE to go the way of ADIT, IRAE isn't great (although passable since DIES IRAE is famous in classical circles), and ATTU might be borderline to some — but overall, cleanly executed. Well done.