Nick S

This was a really clean Thursday puzzle with a good theme. I agree with many who are disappointed by Deb Amlen's slight negativity. All she is saying is that she has seen trickier puzzles. But this is really just a criticism of the editorial team that placed this puzzle on Thursday rather than Wednesday. Probably, she is not allowed to say that. I don't think the creator should take anything from this.

Fiendishly good, either way you look at it. well done constructors.

Really good puzzle today. At first glance it seemed undoable for me with unknown facts and people's names. But once i got a foothold... there were TILs galore. Cluing was clever. Top middle section was last and second last was bottom right. Then 62A gave me the book title and I somehow then recognized 53A. More, please, from Katie Hoody

Very crunchy today with lots of PHIL I had to guess at (until memory clicked in). Was Camilla really an HRH before her elevation? I didn't think so but the editors always get these things right. DID irritated me.

I liked this one because it had some easy fill mixed with long entries for the rebi. The top right corner was harder as I didn't know Uzi or Azul. For a while I had nursemidwife with rosemint and thought nip was a good answer for quick refresher. Finally pink occurred to me so the rest fell. Good Wednesday Kareem.

Couldn't remember any of the singers but after pipe organ and rassler, remembered Renee, of course. The others came on crosses and letter juggling for tatted up. Larry Snyder, I sing your praises.

This was another great puzzle. Very clever cluing made this a question of when to put in your best guess. I find that I wait on confirmation from crosses before filling in that first/second/third guess. For example 54A I guessed early as "tugsat". But I waited until 47D fell into place before filling in "tugs" then saw that tugson would fit rather than my first guess. Similarly with ligers/tigons. I think I'm describing routine puzzle solving for all of you experienced solvers, but new ones might appreciate talk about the thinking process. BTW I knew none of the proper names (except Borg), nor any of the sport terms.

Excellent, fun puzzle. A very rewarding fill experience. Tried REV and EVS for 117D and 128A before going to the backup plan with a P.

This was a nice one. TIL oleate probably means more than one kind of fatty acid compound, George Segal's movie (didn't fill that in until I had K_NG), KISMET is from arabic, Shepherd's first name and the name of the first secretary of war. I was really helped by being able to go back and forth between theme entries and "spells". Well done Bill.

Great puzzle. Didn't know meeple and had nothing at first glance. Then bottom right fell into place and I had polygraph. Couldn't remember who acted in two and a half. But little by little the pieces fell in place for a most satisfying solve. What board game has a meeple?

Without pursuing (perusing) the other comments: Wow, what a great puzzle and fantastic achievement. Not too crunchy with lots of straightforward clues but enough trickiness to make it enjoyable. Daniel must be one of the canniest instances of a constructor

This was a great puzzle with just enough freebies to make it possible to get to the theme without too much sweat. I had "nopar...." and a bunch of the south west corner not including "Dutch oven". Then air guitar occurred to me leading to filling in 50A and 17A and making the rest of the theme clues transparent. 5A reminded me of my English father who sometimes referred to "witty japes and wheezes". I look forward to more from Mr. Schoenholz.

This was fun to do and not PLANE at all. One factoid you might not know: InDesign was originally PageMaker developed by Aldus who eventually sold to Adobe. For a short while I had that at 23 down and then reconsidered the obscurity of that answer.

Great puzzle! My experience seems different from many others as I completed the entire left side plus selfdrivingcars but then wanted 22D to be step which didn't fit with 31A. Then the long verticals on the right side came in. Really nice cluing except I don't know "jinx".

Great puzzle to work through without too much obscure trivia (that I didn't know😄). Tripped up at 51D - thought ERI might also be Hebrew, and RIVERADAR might be a thing. Keep up the good work Simeon even if it takes five years to show

Awesome debut for the constructor. This solve came nicely with no questionable fill, a few letters needed only for the longer entries and very funny clueing. I enjoyed it immensely. Let's get more from you, Alex Murphy.

Had CRAB for 4A but couldn't get any further until struck by an IDEA. This puzzle TIEd me in nots until I removed the BLINKERS. Nice puzzle Adam.

Had this figured in top left and middle, then top right started with Sadat but daydream for 10 d. Solved the rest but stuck on taj jamon - ugh. Finally thought it was lamalamadingdong. I'd have preferred the original clue.