The Pangakupu puzzle in The Guardian this week threw up one of those pleasant moments: a clue that disguises its cryptic nature. The clue was
Small body of water, and reducing in size? (4,3)
The answer was ARAL SEA, a rapidly diminishing sea (now lakes, in effect) between Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, and the initial observation was that it was not a cryptic clue at all.
But its wordplay is: als(o) [and, reducing] in area [size].
It wasn’t even the first time a clue like it for ARAL SEA had appeared in The Guardian, but it caught a good number of people out. This is gratifying for a setter who strives to write clues that don’t always read as ‘crosswordese’ but which can be interpreted as ordinary prose.
A further pleasure was the book
The new puzzle on the site this time is a daily from January 2011. I was going to say it had no theme, but I see that my comment on the fifteensquared blog contradicts me. It doesn’t have much of a theme, even so…
Forthcoming puzzles see two Times Quick Cryptics (on 15 and 27 April) to add to the regular Friday Independent appearances. For now I have proofs to check (news about that one in due course) and a Sussex Pond Pudding to attempt.
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