New York Times, Wednesday, April 26, 2017

I don't always construct crosswords, but when I do…

I'm a third-year English major at Ohio State with an emphasis on creative writing. In my spare time, I enjoy playing strategy board games and rearranging letters in my brain. Though I'm a lifelong fan of Scrabble and word puzzles, I wasn't really bitten by the crossword bug until a year or so ago. For some reason, 'words' such as QAT and ZA had always seemed second nature to me, but having to know the names of minor European rivers seemed frustratingly obscure. It's a good thing I finally came around, as crossword construction feels like a natural fit for me.

The notion of a theme that was inherently Scrabbly appealed to my inner Scrabble fanatic, and building a puzzle around double-X words seemed like an interesting concept. Because of the small number of possible theme entries and the restrictions of symmetry, as well as the constraint of positioning DOSEQUIS as the last theme entry, I settled on six themers of lengths 10, 8, and 6. The most challenging part of construction was designing a grid layout that allowed for 8 and 6-letter themers in the same row, while also working in the 10-letter theme entries with smooth crossings.

The first section of the grid I filled was the center, locking down GONDOLAS and ARRIVING early on. Though these aren't the most exciting long down entries, I was glad to be able to work in some snazzier seven-letter bonus fill in DIE-HARD, BOX SEAT, and VIN ROSE. I also am rather partial to the side-by-side juxtaposition of YES SIR and SAY NO, and the pairing of FRESNO and MADERA.

I had fully expected Will and Joel to change the vast majority of my clues, so I was pleasantly surprised that approximately three-fourths of my clues made the final cut, although some with minor improvements. Of the clues that survived, I particularly like 8-Across, 10-Down, 20-Across, 23-Across, and 70-Across. That said, my favorite clue of the puzzle by far is Will and Joel's ingenious "Shot blocker?" for ANTI-VAXXER, which I had originally clued as the less eloquent "One against taking a shot?" to echo the clue for TRY at 61-Down (which I was pleased to see also ended up making the cut).

Hopefully, you enjoyed your solve, and if you didn't find this to be the Most Interesting Theme in the World, I'll have something for you next time!

In general, I try to be kind to newbies, erring on the side of encouragement while downplaying puzzle's flaws. So I love when I can flat out call a great debut a great debut. It was fun enough to uncover these crazy double-X entries, but to get that spot-on DOS EQUIS revealer — meaning "two Xs" in Spanish — was so perfect.

I remember running into the word ANTI-VAXXER a while back. It looked so bizarre at first, but within seconds, I decided I loved it. (Not the movement, mind you!) I had meant to seed a themeless with it, but I never got around to it. Great to see it featured today.

I had seen the other themers before, some even in a "phrase containing two Xs" context. But I hadn't seen a puzzle featuring adjacent double Xs. Nice.

A single X can be tough to fill smoothly around. Try filling around 10 of them … plus the Q from DOS EQUIS! I would have bet a lot of money that a new constructor wouldn't be able to produce a silky, lively grid. But I marveled as I solved, each pair of Xs filled around with care. No crutches like OOX or XKE or MXS. Beautiful.

But that's not all! Trent managed to work in some lively bonus entries through those Xs: BOX SEAT, and the lovely pair of ELIXIR and AP EXAM.

I would have liked a little more in terms of long bonuses — ARRIVING is fine, but not snazzy — but to get some YES SIR, VIN ROSE, GONDOLAS was good enough, especially given that I was already getting a lift from uncovering all those smoothly integrated Xs.

Sure, there's a bit of minor ORU (Oral Roberts University), SYS, AGGRO (although I kind of love this term, used in gamerspeak for "lock onto"), RIA, MOA. But those are all easy to gloss over and well worth the great stuff Trent managed to pull off.

It might have made for a perfect Tuesday puzzle — the theme was a little easy for a Wednesday — but all in all, can't wait to see more from Trent.