New York Times, Tuesday, September 2, 2014

I have a really hard time coming up with themes, which is why I don't construct too often. Much of the time, I try to think of an entry I'd like to see in the puzzle, and then try to build a theme around it. This was the case with TEXTBOOK EXAMPLE, which has the sexy 15-letter length and the X's. Incidentally, although I am in grad school right now, I'm happy to say that it has been a long time since I actually had to buy a textbook. I have spent a small fortune on the library copier, however.

I'm very impressed with Ethan's clues. Most of these are his. Lots of good ones, but my favorites are 10D, 12D (I did not know that!), 32D and 38D. I also like 64A, which is a tricky answer to handle. When I consider submissions, I pretty much ignore the constructors' clues, which I know I can revise myself, if necessary. But I do give some preference to contributors (like Ethan) who I know write good clues, and I tend to publish their puzzles more quickly after acceptance.

Today's puzzle takes us back to school, with TEXTBOOK, ROOM and BOARD being types of COLLEGE EXPENSES. Of course, no BEER is drunk by undergrads under the age of 21. Ahem.

Nice job disguising the theme. TEXTBOOK EXAMPLE does relate directly to textbooks, but the others made the theme opaque until the revealer. I enjoy when I have to work a little to figure out what's going on. I did find it a bit odd that TEXTBOOK wasn't pluralized, but it's pretty difficult to find a snappy phrase involving TEXTBOOKS. Plus, I didn't crack much of any TEXTBOOK during undergrad, much less TEXTBOOKS, so perhaps it's fine.

Good thing neither my mom nor dad do crosswords, or read these comments.

Ethan does something unusual today, drawing upon short slots for snappy entries. Three and four-letter entries (fives to a lesser extent) are so prevalent that it's tough to do anything interesting with them. UM, NO is such a great colloquial entry. And MUSTI looks so bizarre in the grid, but MUST I? makes for a snazzy phrase. Well done.

I had an initial hitch when I started the puzzle, hitting the crossing ADEN and SNELL right off the bat, so I was worried about the quality of the fill. Turns out the rest of the puzzle was well executed. ADEN and SNELL aren't "bad" entries per se, but I would much prefer to avoid them as part of my solve, especially when they pop up right off the bat. It might be different if ADEN had more geographic or historical significance, or if I were a fisherman.

Finally, it was useful to read Will's comments about Ethan's strong cluing. Gives me more impetus to redouble my efforts to improve my clue-writing skills. Sometimes it's too easy to get lazy on clue-writing, assuming that Will's going to change them anyway.