Jared Banta author page
1 puzzle by Jared Banta
with Constructor comments
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I've always been very much in awe of past puzzles that contained "maps," and was very interested in the idea of re-telling a story within a puzzle. I hit upon the idea of a trail of BREAD CRUMBS through the grid, and then was delighted to discover that the title HANSEL AND GRETEL was 15 letters long. It was not long before it became apparent what the other theme entries should be. The trouble then became finding a layout and fill that would work well. I went through several drafts before hitting on a solution for the NE corner which allowed me to include the rebus square while still maintaining a recognizable "S" shape with the circled letters. The resulting orientation of black squares I thought was very clean and handsome, and very fillable for the most part.
I will mention for educational purposes that Mr. Shortz was not thrilled with the presence of the central ugly "TNS," but said he could live with it considering the constrictive nature of the placement and amount of theme squares, and the fact that there was no easy way to get rid of it. Hopefully the execution of the theme makes up for this in solvers' minds.
I'm really excited to see this in print, and I hope everyone has fun cracking it!