News and Notes, June 2022
Tournament updates, new books, and other news from around Crossworld
Crosswords for a Cause 2 is a free weekly competition beginning June 6 and ending with a grand prize drawing on July 5. Each of the four puzzles is a meta with weekly prizes. Constructors are Ross Trudeau, Robyn Weintraub, Scott Marrone, and Jon Olsen. Sign up here to solve and submit your first meta answer by June 12.
The STL Crossword Puzzle Tournament is June 18 in St. Louis, MO. Free registration is open now.
Boswords 2022 Summer Tournament is July 24 in Boston, MA with a virtual option. Registration opens June 15.
Two new books of “Sit & Solve” 10x10 crosswords are available now: an easy edition by Adesina O. Koiki and a hard edition by Robyn Weintraub.
Alex Eaton-Salners has published “Puzzlewright Guide to Diagramless Crosswords” with over 50 themed diagramless puzzles and accompanying tips and instructions.
Another round of A-Z Crosswords: Petite Pangram Puzzles is available for order now. A $13 subscription will deliver by email 91 daily 9x11 crosswords co-written by veteran puzzlemakers Peter Gordon and Frank Longo beginning June 19.
Schuyler Velasco wrote “How Wordle brought us back together” for Experience magazine, in which Sam Ezersky and other members of the NYT Games team discuss the communities that have developed around Spelling Bee, Wordle, and crosswords.
Sam Ezersky also made a video for Brut about his work on Spelling Bee.
Ben Zimmer, writing for Beyond Wordplay, talked with A.J. Jacobs, author of “The Puzzler: One Man’s Quest to Solve the Most Baffling Puzzles Ever, From Crosswords to Jigsaws to the Meaning of Life” and Greg Pliska, who constructed a suite of puzzles for the book and created a puzzle hunt that accompanied the publication of the book. Congratulations to Benji Nguyen’s team for winning The Puzzler Hunt. While the contest is over, the puzzles can still be solved. Greg and A.J. also co-hosted an AMA about The Puzzler Hunt, which contains lots of spoilers, tips, and behind the scenes info.
Since the last News & Notes, Richard D. Allen (5/17), Paul Steinberg (5/22), Karen Steinberg (5/22), and Carly Schuna (6/7) made their NYT debuts and Ang D’Argenio (6/2) and Kelly Nguyen Dickson (6/6) made their USAT debuts. Congrats to everyone! Check out some of their other work we have enjoyed: Richard’s “Drama Free”, Karen’s 5/28/2022 L.A. Times, Carly’s “Themeless #31” from Inkubator.
Alex Boisvert and his suite of machines at Crossword Nexus continue to expand the offerings of useful tools for constructors. The newest additions are the Onion Clue Generator and Decoupler.
And a couple mind- and medium-bending crosswords that Alex helped make possible that cannot be missed: Again by Will Eisenberg and Verse Jumping by Will Nediger.
The New York Times Games team will soon launch a Gameplay newsletter, a “weekly email filled with puzzles, brain teasers, solving tips and so much more.” Sign up here.