David Kwong author page

Hello Puzzledom! This one has been in the hopper for a long time. Very excited to see it in print. I've always loved crosswords where the acrosses (usually rebuses) read differently than the downs. I did this in December, 2015 with a DIE/DICE puzzle. Probably my favorite example of this is Francis Heaney's legendary flags Sunday puzzle from 2010.

There was some debate on whether or not to have a revealer or a note that tells you how to unlock this puzzle. I'm pleased that the solver will need to figure out the key phrase. I hope you all find it a challenging and satisfying aha moment!

Construction of this puzzle was not easy. I endeavored to have more ONEs that broke up as O - NE or ON - E, but it was virtually impossible with so much thematic content. The ONE phrases needed to be short and there was a dearth of words that were both short and broke up in such a way. I found the best way to to construct this grid was to isolate those rebus squares. Also, I am quite pleased that I only have a single ONE that I use as the number one (AS ONE).

A small plug: I'll be performing The Enigmatist at the Kennedy Center in June 2023. If you're in the area, please join me for a night of puzzling and magic!

Thanks for solving, everyone!

Hello puzzledom! So pleased to be back in the Sunday magazine. And with a puzzle that was years in the making. I love constructing puzzles in which the grid numbers are relevant. As you can imagine, it's a difficult construction feat. Every time you insert or remove a black square, the numbers cascade and change. It's just the kind of torture that we constructors love.

Through earlier versions of the puzzle, I learned about some more subtle things that Will and the team look for. The first is "long answers to engage the solver." Previous versions of the grid got all the numbers to work but the answers were too short. So I had to rework the grid first and foremost to get some 21s in there. The second thing I learned is that Will doesn't like answers that are "too cluey." That means answers that are arbitrary in their wording. For example, I used to have the clue (Double) Dutch lead to GAME USING TWO JUMP ROPES. Answers, I've learned, need to be tight and canonical phrases.

My favorite part of this puzzle has always been the twist with 111-Across. I actually wanted to title the puzzle "Double Headers" and let the solver infer that the same principle, albeit with triple, needed to be applied to 111-Across. But with "Could You Repeat That Number?" I believe they are encompassing all the tricks under one title and that works quite well.

Last, in the bio that accompanies the crossword, Will was kind enough to mention my upcoming virtual puzzle show with the Geffen Playhouse, Inside the Box. Would be thrilled if all you puzzle-heads can join! There will be fun interactive games, twists and turns and surprises. Below is the poster for the show. There might be something else going on in this image ... if you know what it is, please message me on Instagram or Twitter (@davidkwong).

The show premieres on 9/29 with times for both the East and West Coasts. All ages are welcome! More info about Inside the Box is here at the Geffen Playhouse website. Happy solving!

It's so nice to be back on glossy newsprint! Haven't had a Sunday puzzle for 9 years. Last one was Kevan Choset and my Mad Magazine Fold-In puzzle in 2010!

This one has been cooking for a number of years. I originally submitted it five years ago and Will took issue with a couple of entries. I had OTTO THE ORANGE (Syracuse mascot) for Sports, and BLUE DIAMONDS (rare South African gemstones) for Geography. He thought both of those were too obscure. I agree. And so, years later I pulled out the puzzle again and did a complete re-grid — started at square one. I think it works much better now and I'm proud of the theme intersections! So, this puzzle was five years in the making!

And the new constructor blurbs are so nice! I'm grateful for the Times for mentioning my show in New York City, The Enigmatist. If you're coming through, please come check it out! It's an "immersive evening of puzzles, cryptography and illusions." More info here.

And the trailer has quite a few hidden puzzles in it as well. Enjoy!

I've been looking for another magic themed puzzle ever since Kevan Choset and I had MAGIC WORDS in the Times ten years ago!

There weren't a ton of "ladies" that worked for this puzzle. They needed to be well-known and have an even number of letters. MARMALADE was out, unfortunately.

I was excited when I saw CHATTERLEY would work and this largely drove the puzzle.

JANE was almost impossible to hide in anything but JANET. I toyed with JANEIRO, but it did not work with the black square lay out. Similarly, I wanted to distance GREY from the surname and fought with the grid to make THE GREY happen. Lost that battle.

Ultimately though, I am pleased that I was able to get a stack of 4, 6, 8, and 10 lettered ladies.

The original submission for this puzzle had the central clue as "What they saw in Las Vegas?" and not "what some performers saw". I guess Will and Joel thought that was too hard.

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed it. I'm proud of the construction and fill. Tada! (sorry)

My pal Kevan Choset told me this joke a few years ago so I decided to turn it into a puzzle. I bet he's super mad at me right now. Hopefully he's not reading this post.

It wasn't that easy to get this quip to fit. I had probably a dozen different versions of it, varying the "connecting" words and the tense of it. JACQUESCOUSTEAU was always going to be a 15, but the rest required a lot of massaging.

(Jeff: David is up to all sorts of cool stuff. Check out his new book, info at Publishers Weekly and Amazon. And a cool magic trick below ... on the Today Show!)

Just over a year ago Martin Gero, the creator of "Blindspot," hired me to consult on the puzzles for his new NBC show. When we started cooking up ideas for where to hide secret messages naturally we thought of the NYT crossword. We pitched Will the idea and he agreed!

So here we have a Monday puzzle that is also featured on screen during the 4/4 and 4/11 episodes. It was not easy to make! I had to put in a message for the Blindspot viewers while maintaining the integrity of the crossword. After lots of back and forth with Joel Fagliano, I finally settled on the theme of BACK COUNTRIES. This worked well because countries are large enough of a category that I had lots of options for themers. And with the secret message adding in another thing to juggle, it was helpful to be flexible.

Will and Joel pushed me to make the countries at least five letters (OMAN and MALI were too easy). I am particularly fond of CLEARSIGN (ISRAEL) and WAYNEKNIGHT (KENYA), and happy to give the latter his crossword debut!

Other rejected options:

• CARMINA BURANA
• NO BAGGAGE
• DAIRY SECTION

Hope you enjoy the puzzle and the episode!

I'm proud of the trick in this one, but I think I'm even prouder of the fill. I tried very hard to have very little crosswordese — did I succeed? You be the judge =) I originally submitted this puzzle with no partial phrases. Will since changed the clue to ASA from "Botanist Gray" to "__ whole ..." Totally understandable.

I'm always fascinated by the unwritten rules of crossword making: not too many 3-letter words, nice looking patterns of black squares etc. In this case, I learned that even though 78-words is the limit for a daily puzzle, Shortz prefers not to run 78-ers on Thursdays.

So I got the word count down to 76, which was not an easy task! And I'm pleased how it turned out. I think the long themers are fun, and I'm glad LONGISLANDICEDTEA breaks up the letters between two words. RUSHDIE was a must-have for me, and I am so glad I was able to get that word to span two of the long themers.

Hope you enjoy it!

So I have a secret . . . I love pandas! There, I've said it.

This is my first foray into grid art. The "eyes" of the grid came pretty quickly for me as a starting point. I always love pushing the rules ever so slightly, so I was pleased when the unchecked squares looked good. After that, there aren't many other placements that work for the nose and ears.

The "triple PA" was a must have for me. Once I got into the corners, it wasn't too difficult to add more PA's, especially near the bottom, which is broken up a little more. I was a little iffy on ENSE and SSTS in the South East and was willing to sacrifice one of the PA's. But Will seemed to be ok with it, so voila, there are 11 PA's That's good right?!

Have to tip my hat to Patrick Blindauer who beat me to the "panda punch" about a year ago. But I hope that with my cute and cuddly grid art, solvers find this fresh and fun.

As a magician, I am once again pleased to add a little bit of illusion to the New York Times crossword puzzle.

The "trick" answer was difficult to place. It had to be in the SE corner or resting on top of a horizontal row of black squares. This is because the answer couldn't start down answers.

I enjoyed coming up with down clues in the SE corner that were slightly misleading, hopefully yielded confusion for CAP vs. GOWN, THE vs. CAFE, SNOW vs SLEET, SPA vs BATH, perhaps even EUGENE vs SEATTLE.

The most challenging aspect of the puzzle was finding four Halloween creatures that were the same word-length. I was afforded a little flexibility with VAMPIRE and DRACULA being both seven letters long. At one point I had SPECTER but nixed it because I thought one could argue that a specter/ghost also wouldn't have a reflection.

Eventually, I stumbled upon the Universal Monsters characters and felt like the crossword gods were blessing me. All hail the crossword gods!

Hope you enjoyed the puzzle and Happy Halloween!