New York Times, Saturday, October 9, 2021

Hello Cruciverbalists, I'm excited to make my New York Times debut! I'm only fourteen, but it was inevitable that I would get into solving and constructing crossword puzzles. From an early age, I watched my entire family solve the NYT puzzles, including my grandmother and grandfather. At nine, I started solving the puzzles with my dad. More accurately, I would sit and watch him fill them in. Now, I can solve the Monday and Tuesday puzzles on my own, and portions of the rest of the week. At ten, I started constructing crossword puzzles with my dad, and at eleven, I made my first solo crossword.

During the first summer of the pandemic, I had a lot of free time and made 10-15 puzzles, including my first themelesses. My strategy for constructing a themeless is to find a manageable looking grid (68-72 words) and then try to fill it with as many of my favorite words as possible, making NO compromises. My basic approach for themelesses is that any liability, especially if it's four or more letters, means the puzzle needs reworking. I have the same basic approach for themed puzzles. Overall, I would say that I prefer constructing themed puzzles, but filling a puzzle with my favorite words can be just as fun as a great theme.

Thanks to the Times for greatly improving my puzzle's clues (I've gotten better!) I have a Thursday waiting in the queue, so see you again soon!

Sticking to an established themeless genre is a sensible way for many themeless constructors to get started. I appreciate that August took the "stair stack" pattern two steps higher, going to five long answers in the middle, not just three. Fun for the baseball fans out there to get SPLITTERS atop STRIKE ONE, and ALL ABOARD, TRUE CRIME, and FAIR SHAKE all evoke vivid imagery. That's an impressive quintet anchoring the puzzle.

I also appreciate that August didn't stand pat but worked hard to thread ICE CASTLES and TEAM EVENTS through the stair stack. Such a beautiful way to connect to the puzzle's outskirts.

I found myself wanting more juice out of the corners. It's tough to fill a 7x4 swath like the NW, and when you have ICE CASTLES fencing it in and CLAUDE MONET running through it, there's not much flexibility left. All the entries work, but SEA DUTY isn't going to win any awards, and Ron ELY's days in the spotlight are long passed.

I studied the grid skeleton for a long time, wondering if there were some way to open up a few more long slots in the corners, perhaps by making the NW / SE corners narrower and thus easier to spice up. Not an easy task, but I think at least one more slot might be possible in the lower left corner.

Excellent job with the cluing; so many Saturday-hard clever clues. I counted about five, and they all sizzled. I couldn't decide which one I enjoyed most, from a LOLLIPOP being "stick-y" (referring to its stick), or [Scales up?] pointing at the LIBRA sign in the sky, or the innocent [More than discouraged]. I was so sure that was something along like the lines of DESPONDENT, but it meant the ILLEGAL sense.

Enjoyable debut. I like seeing new constructors with ambition.

The hugely popular TRUE CRIME podcast (35-Across) Serial is brilliantly parodied in the Hulu series Only Murders in the Building, starring Steve Martin, Martin Short, and Selena Gomez. Tiny Fey is the Sarah Koenig stand-in.

Listen for the music. It's not exactly the Serial theme, but it's cleverly reminiscent.

Mr. Lee-Kovach checks in at number 5 on our Teenage Constructors page.