Stan Newman's Daily Crossword Tips Jan 08 - 14, 2023
Solving crosswords every day is a fun and healthy habit that will build and strengthen your problem-solving skills. Whether you're new to crosswords, or a seasoned solver, everyone can use a helpful hint now and then. Come back every week to see the digest of daily tips that will help you achieve the satisfaction of solving a crossword a day.
Sunday, January 8th, 2023
A CENTURY AGO: What happened in 1923, by S.N.
Difficulty level: Medium
Some of the trickier clues: 56 Across, 86 Across, 59 Down, 88 Down
Today's Tip: Your humble crossword editor has traditionally created a Sunday puzzle at the beginning of each year to commemorate the people, places and things of 100 years before. Especially timely for a 100th anniversary is 24 Across’s company, for which there will be all sorts of celebrations this year.
Play more Sunday crosswords from editor Stan Newman’s archives.
Monday, January 9th, 2023
FOLDERS by Sally R. Stein
Difficulty level: Easy
Easy clues suggested for you to begin with: 1 Across, 25 Across, 7 Down, 41 Down
Today's Tip: “Sally R. Stein” has long been a pseudonym for your humble crossword editor, which I’ve used for the easiest Monday and Tuesday puzzles of the week. “Sally R. Stein” being an anagram of “it’s really S.N.”
The “FOLDERS” in the title aren’t for your files, but as mentioned in the four theme clues, different things that can fold.
Play more crosswords at this same level from editor Stan Newman’s archives.
Tuesday, January 10th, 2023
WINTRY by Billie Truitt
Difficulty level: Easy
Easy clues suggested for you to begin with: 6 Across, 23 Across, 7 Down, 13 Down
Today's Tip Today’s theme, as hinted at by the title, consists of common phrases containing words appropriate to the season.
Play more crosswords at this same level from editor Stan Newman’s archives.
Wednesday, January 11th, 2023
PAY DAY by Guilherme Gilioli
Difficulty level: Easy-Medium
Easy clues suggested for you to begin with: 1 Across, 27 Across, 10 Down, 22 Down
Today's Tip: Though Guilherme lives and works in Brazil, he is thoroughly familiar with American English and popular culture, thanks to the Internet. It shouldn’t take you very long to figure out what the three longest answers in the puzzle have to do with the title.
Play more crosswords at this same level from editor Stan Newman’s archives.
Thursday, January 12th, 2023
HOLD ‘EM by Winston Emmons
Difficulty level: Medium-Hard
Easiest clues suggested for you to begin with: 12 Across, 61 Across, 11 Down, 21 Down
Tricky clues to watch out for: 9 Across, 39 Across, 36 Down
Today's Tip: Most solvers find Thursdays noticeably knottier than Wednesdays, which is what is intended. Though there will be a few tricky clues (whose true meanings are likely to be different from what first comes to mind), many clues are deliberately worded so that multiple answers are likely to occur to you. Such as 21 Across and 9 Down
Play more crosswords at this same level from editor Stan Newman’s archives.
Friday, January 13th, 2023
CLASHIN’ FASHION by Kevin Christian
Difficulty level: Hard
Easiest clues suggested for you to begin with: 58 Across, 34 Down, 46 Down, 53 Down
Tricky clues to watch out for: 40 Across, 47 Across, 45 Down, 51 Down
Today's Tip: This is one of the funniest ideas I’ve had in quite a while. It doesn’t give anything away to tell you how “clashing” the four longest answers are, if someone would actually wear them all at the same time.
Play more crosswords at this same level from editor Stan Newman’s archives.
Saturday, January 14th, 2023
SATURDAY STUMPER by Matthew Sewell
Difficulty level: Very Hard
Most straightforward clues: 18 Across, 52 Across, 7 Down, 52 Down
Trickiest clues to watch out for: 19 Across, 23 Across, 57 Across, 30 Down
Today's Tip: The themeless Saturday Stumpers are deliberately designed to be the most challenging daily crosswords available anywhere, and are widely acknowledged by champion-level puzzle fans to be just that. The most important tip to always keep in mind: expect trickery everywhere, and consider the multiple meanings (and/or parts of speech) that any clue word might have. If you have trouble getting started, you’ll find it highly enlightening to use the app’s “Reveal puzzle” feature, then compare each clue with its corresponding answer. This is how many have developed the skills to fully solve Saturdays.
Play more crosswords at this same level from editor Stan Newman’s archives.
How did it go?
Did you find this week’s digest of daily tips helpful? Did you find a clue that really stumped you? Join your fellow crossword fans in the comments on Stan Newman’s Daily Crossword puzzle page. Share your tips and tricks to solving puzzles. To join the discussion, click here and scroll down to the bottom of the page to the comments to engage with other puzzle solvers just like you.
About this week’s puzzle authors:
Stan Newman
Since 1988, Stan Newman has been the Crossword Editor for the Long Island, New York newspaper Newsday, where he is widely acknowledged as America’s preeminent expert in customizing crosswords by level of difficulty. During his career, he has also been Founding Editor for the popular “Crosswords with Friends” app, Managing Director of Puzzles and Games for Random House, and has authored or edited over 200 books - including crossword puzzle books, word game books, and crossword reference books.
Stan has written many thousands of his own crosswords over the years, including the first crosswords ever to appear in the Wall Street Journal, People and Newsweek magazines.
As a puzzle solver, he has held since 1996 the world's record for the fastest completion of a New York Times crossword: 2 minutes, 14 seconds.
Billie Truitt
Billie Truitt has been constructing puzzles for Stan since 2008, specializing in the easier Tuesday puzzles, expanding into Fridays and Sundays in recent years. She lives with her husband and son in Windsor, Connecticut.
Guilherme Gilioli
Guilherme Gilioli is a Brazilian full-time crossword constructor, creating puzzles for newspapers, magazines, books and apps in 3 languages (Portuguese, English and Spanish). He started creating his own puzzles in 2017 and publishing them online on his own website. In 2021 he dropped his regular job at a hardware store to dedicate himself only to puzzle-making.
His hobbies are collecting and solving Rubik's Cubes, reading, taking strolls and playing with his cat Tigrinho (“Tiger”).
Winston Emmons
Winston Emmons has taught in middle school and high school, created software documentation and training, and worked as a consultant developing educational curricula for the performing arts as well as process management systems for business organizations. He published his first crossword puzzle in 2015. Winston and his wife live in Florida and have three adult children.
Kevin Christian
Kevin Christian lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife Helen and two dogs, Finn and Otis. Their children Tim and Kate are both away at college.
He has been making crossword puzzles since 2010. His puzzles have appeared in Newsday, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Wall Street Journal, AMS Universal, and various other publications.
Kevin works for a tech company in Silicon Valley. In his spare time he likes to ride his bike, walk his dogs, make and solve crossword puzzles, go to concerts, watch horror movies, and listen to heavy metal. One of his favorite horror movies is the Swedish film “Let the Right One In” from 2008. One of his favorite metal bands is King’s X.
His father was in the Air Force so he moved around a lot while he was growing up. He lived in California, Hawaii, South Carolina, the Philippines, Ohio, Texas, New York, and Alabama. He graduated from Armijo High School in Fairfield, California, and from college at the University of California, Davis.
Matthew Sewell
Matthew Sewell is a professor of literature and film at Minnesota State University. His first puzzle for Newsday appeared in 2015. He especially enjoys making puzzles with challenging-but-gettable entries and fresh, unexpected clues. For those interested in learning how to make publishable crosswords, he recommends Patrick Berry's Crossword Constructor Handbook (available online at aframegames.com) as well as the kind people at the Facebook group Crossword Puzzle Collaboration Directory.