Michael T. Buerke author page
1 puzzle by Michael T. Buerke
with Jeff Chen comments
| S | A | L | S | A | C | A | R | B | S | L | I | L | ||
| A | R | O | A | R | A | L | E | R | T | O | N | O | ||
| B | I | R | D | S | O | F | P | R | E | Y | L | B | S | |
| R | E | E | F | E | R | H | U | A | B | L | O | T | ||
| E | L | S | A | G | R | A | N | D | P | R | I | X | ||
| C | A | S | H | B | O | O | P | |||||||
| T | I | B | E | T | Y | E | T | I | S | O | D | D | ||
| I | D | I | D | N | T | M | E | A | N | T | O | P | R | Y |
| P | O | T | O | V | E | R | T | E | N | S | U | E | ||
| T | R | O | D | A | C | R | E | |||||||
| T | E | N | N | I | S | P | R | O | B | L | A | H | ||
| S | A | R | A | N | E | O | R | O | Y | A | L | E | ||
| T | H | E | A | N | N | I | E | P | R | O | U | L | X | |
| E | O | N | J | E | S | S | E | I | N | D | I | E | ||
| W | E | D | A | R | E | E | L | T | E | E | N | S |
Haters of this theme type call them "Vowel Movements," while others appreciate the supervocalic poetry. We have seen a ton of vowel progressions over the years, but there are a few factors helping this one (warning: pun alert) make progress:
Consistency. Every P+(long vowel sound) is only one syllable. No PRO-test from me here.
Neat spellings. "Pru" sounding the same as PROULX? Love it. Same goes for "pre" and PRIX. My French friends down the street might be overinfluencing me these days.
Misdirects. Only one themer uses its vowel (PRO and the O) — no PRAY, for example, which would make the theme drabber. It wasn't clear to me that we were making a V.M. until I got to PRO.
Fantastic find in I DIDNT MEAN TO PRY. Colorful phrase, and its length (15) makes it a perfect middle-row themer. It's much easier to grid around than a central 9, 11, or 13, which would force black square placements and thus take away flexibility.
The cluing touches helped to elevate the Monday solve. Loved the newb-accessible wordplay in [They're for suckers] punning on LOLLIPOPS. Great to get freshness in the clue for RHYME, too, riffing on Prancer and Dancer but not Rudolph and Vixen.
It'd be all too easy to convince yourself that with five themers, you can stop at two long bonuses and call it good. I love the effort to go above and beyond, especially in a debut, with such color in SAD FACED, TV DINNER, ONE BY ONE — doing so without causing a BITTER END in the short fill. About three dabs of crossword glue (EER, OR IT, AJA) is acceptable for an average puzzle, and it's excellent given how many snappy long Downs they enabled.
Tough to make yet another vowel progression stand out, but this one worked well.