New York Times, Thursday, August 4, 2016

This was my first crossword accepted by the New York Times — so exciting! (TOP OFF was accepted second, but published first.) Will and Joel liked the "wacky theme" of my submission, and saw it as "a fun change of pace for solvers."

I hope this puzzle's new perspective on the Q provides for a satisfying a-ha moment!

This puzzle got the BOOT! Neat to see the Os in various cars become Qs, that little diagonal line looking like an actual boot — if you write the Q in uppercase, that is. I imagine the people scribbling a lowercase "q" didn't have much of an idea of what was going on.

Very cool visual. I especially liked the NAVIGATQR, as the Q was in the back tire spot, where you usually see boots. In contrast, it felt odd to see the wheel and boot in the middle of EXPLQRER and CHERQKEE. Still, I appreciated Jonathan's effort of choosing four well-known car models from four well-known car makers, and tightening his choices by only using models with exactly one O.

Fun to get PRIVATE EYES, TRIFECTA, and DRONE BEE, too; all nice bonuses. I wasn't as much a fan of PRACTICABLE. It is a real word, but that 11-letter space is such prime real estate. It's a bit like a prized piece of land going into a bidding war … and the winner turns it into a parking lot.

As with his debut puzzle, there were a few rough spots in the fill. It's perfectly passable to have a bit of minor N DAK, TOITY (can only be clued one way), DIAS, since most grids — especially ones with so many hard-to-work-with Qs — will require some compromises. It's less elegant to have ASLANT and ASWIRL crossing each other, which makes them stand out even more. (They are real words, but especially ASWIRL has an old-timey feel that personally makes me wince.)

All in all, I would have preferred more car-like visuals, as with a previous Gorski puzzle. I did like the fact that each themer getting the boot was an actual car, but I would have loved the puzzle if each themer had exactly two Os, one at the second slot and one at the penultimate, with the latter getting the boot.