Ricky Cruz author page

ADAM: Gotta love working with Ricky! He's got such a unique voice as a constructor (see every puzzle on his epic blog Cruzzles, and it definitely shines through here—when he casually dropped COINKYDINK as a fill option, I knew this puzzle was going somewhere. We toyed at the grid for over three months last year, starting with the top-left stack and then iterating through tons of possibilities via Twitter and Discord DMs.

Speaking of Discord, I can't stress enough how fantastic the Crossword Discord Server has been at uniting the global crossword community, and Ricky built it from the ground up! If you haven't joined, what the heck are you waiting for?

RICKY: Working with Adam was such a fun experience (you guys should definitely also check out his puzzle blog; he messaged me around early pandemic time to collab on a themeless, showing me the beautiful northwest stack. We had fun cluing this grid; the editors came up with some great clues as well. We were both stumped on how to clue FORCE IN without including "in" in the clue (go ahead and try it), and the simplicity of the edited clue blew our minds.

Since Adam plugged the Discord, I'll shout out his site Wordlisted, which is a huge asset for constructors of themed puzzles. It's basically an all-purpose search for different word patterns in a wordlist, and I can't recommend it enough.

The NYT has recently started sending proofs to constructors before they get finalized, and it's very great to have that say in what gets published. In this puzzle, LYDIA (who I originally clued as the "Beetlejuice" character) was edited to be the ancient province. I place personal importance on keeping as many women's names in puzzles as I can (as references usually skew male), so being able to ask for a change (and to a more prominent Lydia, at that) is such a great opportunity to have.

This is a very common early-week theme type, so I don't have much to comment on themewise. I think the AMPERSAND and ASTERISK finds are what make the theme worth it, as those lengthy strings are always fun to discover from a construction standpoint, and the goal is always that they entertain solvers as well. I'm also happy I got to give a shoutout to the oft-neglected tilde, one of the many diacritic marks that gets left out of foreign-language crossword answers.

While I'm happy with ROSARIES, SCOTUS, and SLEEP IN, I'm finding that longer bonuses are what make early-week puzzles shine, and I'd like to do more with those in the future.

Hope everyone enjoys the puzzle!

This was a very fun puzzle to construct; making the crosses in the traffic jam mesh was interesting. Peter Gordon's rainbow puzzle had a similar challenge, but Peter had a much tougher job, as he was dealing with a forced arrangement and more rebus squares. Elizabeth Gorski also dealt with those restrictions in her New Year's Eve 2002 puzzle and her poker-themed puzzle from 2005, among others. So my restrictions weren't too tight, but they were a fun challenge. (Also, I like the bonus of SEMI and TRUCK going across two squares, as if one SEMI TRUCK was taking up two spaces.)

I'm very happy with the result, but as usual, I think this puzzle could be improved. I could have done more with the outside themers than simple traffic-adjacent answers; maybe CAR squares winding through the grid and ending at the BOTTLENECK would be fun. Additionally, lengthening the rebus crosses to words like [CAR]OLE KING and WEATHER [VAN]E would be more fun; these crosses are clean, but the center is structurally tough to crack into. I clued the crosses easily in my submission to counter that, but it looks like they've been clued harder in the edit (no complaints, though; I love harder clues).

Hope everyone enjoys the puzzle! Also, as always, the Crossword Discord Server is open for anyone to join and chat about puzzle-solving and construction; hope to see some new people there!

I love crosswords that implement another game in the grid, but often there's the hangup of requiring a notepad to explain the gimmick. I'm fine with coming across them in other puzzles, but for my own puzzles I'm a purist; if it can't be done without a notepad, it's not worth it for me to construct. So going into this, I wanted to make sure the whole thing was self-contained, which was a success.

The big change the editing team made theme-wise is that the differences are already circled, which is a bit of a let-down, but probably for the best, as the clues I wrote to explain BLACK and WHITE felt convoluted. Seeing as those squares are shaded and circled, I'm eager to see if the intended format will be present in the .PUZ file, which doesn't do shaded squares.

I'm very happy with the fill in this puzzle; if I were redoing it now, though, I'd redo the shaded areas and make them sparkling; as the first areas filled, I could've done better than SEN/DOA/DO AWAY/KSU, as much as they pass. Clue-wise, I like the edits that Will and co. made, and I'm delighted to see the gaming-adjacent clues that survived the edit. I'm stoked to have my first Sunday puzzle in the Times; I hope it's enjoyable for everyone.

Also, I'd like to re-extend the invitation to join the Crossword Discord Server, where we talk about solving and construction. I'm considering adding roles and channels for mentorship and collaborations soon, especially if there's a demand for that in the Discord-space.

Firstly, I'd like to apologize to the Spanish-speaking folks out there for using TAMALE as the singular for "tamales." As I'm sure my family will remind me, the proper singular is "tamal"; "tamale" is an English-ism. Maybe if I debut TAMAL, that'll make up for it. Someday.

I'm surprised to see how many of my clues made the final cut. I wrote this puzzle back when I had more trouble writing tough clues. For example, I originally had [Initiator] for CAUSE and [Closes, as a purse] for ZIPS, which aren't exactly Wednesday-level. I'm sad that AT-AT, as originally clued, was reparsed as A-TAT, which I wouldn't personally use. I'm very curious how easy this will skew for solvers.

If I were redoing this puzzle, I'd try removing the blocks above OKRA/below EMIT to keep those corners from being closed-off on top of lacking theme material. I included DORA to add another female name in the mix, but I don't think OOFS was worth losing the alternative of OAFS/DARA. I also wouldn't have been as stubborn about including the X in the southeast. Overall though, I'm satisfied with the fill and the theme, and I hope this is an enjoyable experience.

Lastly, if you're a solver or constructor who uses Discord, we have a server for discussing crossword solving and construction!

Very happy to be making my NYT debut, especially with a Thursday puzzle! Thursdays have a lot of my favorite themes, and I hope this one fits in with the rest.

The original plan was a "magic mirror" theme, where magic-themed words reflected across the center of the puzzle. I found lots of trouble getting the grid to work with me, and I later found that David Kwong executed it pretty darn well a few years ago. Ideas developed, and I landed on the idea of replacing the word MIRROR with a mirror image of the word before it. As a bonus, I got to include BLACK MIRROR, which everyone should be watching always.

I'm happy with the edits Will & co. made; I was very much expecting tougher clues in the final version, and the editors delivered. I'm a little sad that DOT got re-clued as an acronym instead of a word, but the other edits more than make up for it, so I'll live.

A note on ABIERTO, as I suspect it's going to be tough for many solvers: I first had DELPHI/RAISE TO/USA/MEDS as 6- to 9-Down, and I think it's much better fill. It was changed because RAISE TO was hella hard to clue; I had [Set at, as a thermostat in winter], which a test solver told me was pretty strange, so I refilled with ABIERTO. In retrospect, sticking with RAISE TO was the move, but the final version wasn't too bad, and I'm very happy with the finished product.

Hope you enjoy the puzzle!