New York Times, Thursday, January 2, 2014

I first tried this puzzle on Peter Gordon in March of 2012. He liked the theme idea, but didn't like that every theme entry would take the same form. I tried sending it to Will in July of 2012: he liked the idea more, just asking me to improve the fill in places. After a couple of resubmissions, he accepted this puzzle the same day (in the same e-mail, in fact) as David's and my recent Crossword Centennial puzzle.

I don't remember where the idea came from, but I was really glad I could use 51 Across as a theme revealer (my original clue was "Taking liberties ... as with this puzzle's theme"). I'm also interested in seeing how 8 Down will be clued: a straight (if somewhat racy) definition, or a reference to the 45 year old hit song? Also, I couldn't resist referencing Stan Newman's book Cruciverbalism to clue 52 Down...I'm guessing that clue will be changed.

Sometimes I think every possible Thursday gimmick must have been used by now ... but, no. Great new ideas, like today's, keep showing up. That's one reason I maintain an "open submissions" policy at The Times, unlike many British papers, which limit crossword submissions to a select few. Todd Gross is only an occasional contributor, and if he weren't on that hypothetical roster of approved submitters, he wouldn't have sent me this beautiful puzzle. In addition to the four long theme entries, I love the bonus one at 32A.

Man oh man, it took me forever to cotton to this very innovative theme. Five theme answers are quasi-literal interpretations of phrases where the first word ends in ENDING. For example, the first theme answer is VENDING MACHINES, written out as MACHINES V (machine with V-ending). Tough, huh?

The hardest part was finishing the middle, where I didn't expect there to be a fifth theme answer (MENDING WALL written as a WALL with a M-ending). Will has said in the past that he prefers to have the theme answers stand out in some way, usually by making them the longest answers in the puzzle (or at least the longest answers in the across direction). That would have helped me greatly here, as I found it very confusing to have a shorty smack dab in the middle. But perhaps a little changeroo is good every now and then to keep everyone on their toes.

Note the wide-open nature of the grid. At just 70 words, it could qualify as a themeless puzzle. But any time you work with themeless-level word counts plus four (or more) theme answers, there are bound to be trade-offs. Todd has some nice long fill in here: LOVE CHILD and MATTRESS with its fun clue are really nice, but overall, there were enough compromises to affect the quality of my solve. Seeing too much of AMATIVE, UNLOOSES, GROFE, ARACE, etc. took me out of the experience somewhat.

I do wish there had been more wordplay type of cluing to help keep the solve a little more playful, especially as I was banging my head against the (non-mending) wall, attempting to figure out what the heck was going on. Overall though, I applaud the decision to push the boundaries of construction.