Jay Silverman author page
1 puzzle by Jay Silverman
with Jeff Chen comments
| A | B | E | R | U | S | E | M | E | T | R | O | |||
| C | O | N | A | Z | U | R | F | O | R | H | E | R | ||
| O | D | D | W | O | N | D | E | R | B | R | E | A | D | |
| L | Y | R | A | B | O | L | O | S | E | R | A | |||
| Y | O | U | N | G | B | U | C | K | S | B | A | L | I | |
| T | I | N | N | I | E | R | S | E | A | L | S | I | N | |
| E | L | S | V | E | N | N | W | A | T | T | S | |||
| P | E | T | T | Y | C | A | S | H | ||||||
| A | S | P | E | N | T | R | O | N | B | I | G | |||
| D | E | A | L | S | T | O | I | N | A | N | I | T | Y | |
| V | E | S | T | W | H | I | T | E | P | A | P | E | R | |
| I | N | T | A | I | O | L | I | H | O | R | A | |||
| S | O | U | N | D | C | H | E | C | K | S | L | A | T | |
| E | T | R | A | D | E | N | A | I | F | A | T | E | ||
| S | E | E | P | S | E | L | M | O | R | E | D |
Today's Next Level Constructor contestant is a fresh face looking to create wonder among the old guard. Ooh, what misfortune to draw the slang for money category, though. There have been so many plays on BREAD, CABBAGE, CHEDDAR, DOUGH, etc. — make no BONES about it, a new constructor BUCKS the trend only with a massively innovative take.
And that's exactly what Jay did. WONDER BREAD, unfortunately, made a recent appearance relating to money, but Jay cannot be faulted for that. To dredge the muck of money slang and pull up such a tight set of terms related to musicians shows that Jay is one of the YOUNG BUCKS.
Four themers in a tight set are often good enough to gain consideration. To tie them all together with the wordplay in SOUND CHECKS is quite a TENDER touch.
Although PAPER isn't as strong as the others when it comes to everyday money slang, if it's your weakest one, you're doing fine. It's not like having to resort to a GREASE or SALAD.
As for presentation, I froze at FROSE. If only crosswords could accommodate accent marks, I wouldn't have paused for a full minute trying to find my error — FROSÉ would visually have been so much more appetizing. You drink with your eyes, after all. Or something like that.
Otherwise, though, an elevated take on a mature theme. With clean and sparkly corners framing his presentation, Jay is gunning for that Next Level Constructor title.