#49: Gentlewoman Thief (Themeless #22)

 

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Hello to everyone visiting QVXwordz for the first time from the link in that Slate profile! I hope you're enjoying my work there... and I hope you aren't scared off by the difficulty of the puzzles on this site! Because what I have for you today is a 64-word themeless that I would call "sizzlin' hot," difficulty-wise. Shout-out to Lila Goldenberg, Will Eisenberg, and Colin Adams (what, no berg?) who all chipped in on the test-solves on this one. (And speaking of shout-outs, check out that 1-Down clue!)

Surprisingly, this is the first themeless grid I've published that was made using Ingrid, the super-cool (and super FREE!) construction software from Ryan Fitzgerald. I say "surprisingly" because I created the program's adorable mascot. She's so cute! The main consequence of this is that there's a couple entries in this grid which weren't on my personal wordlist but which exist on Spread the Word(list), and thus enabled some fun entries here.

What else is new? Hm, well - AVCX's submission window opened on Wednesday, which was nice. We got maybe a dozen submissions on the first day, and only one of them was about butts! I haven't figured out what to do with all the themeless grids I've been making - maybe I'll sell little packs of pay-what-you-want grids on Ko-fi or one of those sorts of websites? And there's always the Redstone app. Let me know what you guys would like, on that front. Anyway, as always, the applet is under the cut; enjoy.

#48: Girls Gone Wild (ft. Richard Allen!)

 

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Hey, it's another themed grid - and this time, it's with a pal! Richard Allen runs the blog Lexicon Devil, where he posts metas and variety puzzles in addition to fun themelesses. In addition to this, he's also solved the puzzle classic Cain's Jawbone and one of the Zodiac Killer's ciphers (!!) - a real smart guy, and a great constructor too.

Anyway, we've got a 78-word themed puzzle of middling difficulty. Nothing too earthshaking, this type of theme, but I think it's a pretty good puzzle, firmly at the intersection of the two of our sensibilities. Especially that final theme entry! Actually, the northwest corner is... *very* Quiara, for better or worse. But we had our fun with this one, and we think you will too.

In case you missed it, I posted an "odds and ends" post earlier today recapping some of the cool stuff I did in the past three months. (I got a new job, among other things.) Anyway, applet under the cut; see you next week, probably.

#47: Sizzlin'

 

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"Hot" off the presses - ha ha ha. This puzzle is 72 words, lightly themed, and slightly tricky (in the fill department, not the theme department). It'll probably get trickier if you're solving this after 49-Across loses its relevance - so, in about a week? Joking, joking.

Lots of great puzzles out there these days, especially in the past month. I don't know if I want to do roundup posts anymore, since the crew at Daily Crossword Links have so kindly been putting their own "puzzles to check out" posts every week, and my recommendations couldn't possibly compare to Matt, Rich, and Shannon's. But while I'm here, I might as well give a shout-out to friend-of-the-blog and regular human streamer rogo, who started a crossword blog last week and whose puzzles feel like they're straight out of the golden age of indie crosswords. (Remind me to update my blogroll along with the rest of the QVXwordz theme overhaul I'm supposed to be doing.) Hey, and just for the hell of it, why don't I shout out the puzzle I made for Crossword Club this past Tuesday? I thought it was pretty good, that one.

Anyway, applet under the cut, as usual. See y'all soon.

#46: Turn That S#!% Up! (Themeless #21)

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This here puzzle is a 70-word themeless, one that I'd say is perhaps on par with a NYT Friday, difficulty-wise - and as the title maybe implies, it's a bit on the vulgar side.

I don't have too much to say about this one, other than to thank Brian Thomas and Aimee Lucido for giving it a test spin. Brian uploaded a massive themeless grid on his blog earlier today, which is definitely worth your time imo. (I'm not just saying this because he called my puzzle "fun, clean, wonderful," although the flattery was appreciated.)

Looking for more QVX content elsewhere? I felt pretty good about the Crossword Club midi puzzle I had this past Thursday, with its weird shape and nice 5x8 stack at its bottom. (The shape makes me think of pinball.) Maybe you're just checking this site via the Daily Crossword Links newsletter, in which case you likely missed the mini I posted Friday and the Alex Boisvert collab that it was meant to advertise. All three of those grids are definitely worth checking out, imo.

Anyway, applet under the cut; enjoy!

#45: Baby Movies

 

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Ah, the triumphant return of everyone's favorite QVXwordz running gag - this time in the form of a somewhat difficult 72-word themed puzzle. (It's about as hard as a trickier NYT Wednesday, I'm told.) I was going to make a joke about how the grid shape on this one was brought to you by the letter S, but - and forgive me if this gets too inside baseball - then I checked the stats on this one and was surprised to find that there were very, very, very few instances of the letter "S" in the grid, relative to most other puzzles. E.g., Themeless 17 on this blog has as its final four across entries TENETS, CASTLES, OP-EDS, and KISSERS. And those are crossing JARS, CUTS, and HURTS. That's seven plural entries in just the final two rows! This is quite typical of crosswords - you hardly notice the surplus of plural entries unless you're solving a themeless where the final entry is SEERESSES or whatever. But this grid only has three plurals in the entire grid (and one is a theme entry so it doesn't count). S is only the third-most common consonant in the puzzle! Quite weird. Anyway, shout-out once again to John K. (who has today's NYT, incidentally) for test solving, as well as to Will Nediger, plus Louie and try_kach from Crosscord who were also very helpful with their feedback on which clues needed a polish pass.

It looks like we're settling into me posting grids every Sunday this year, which means I'll have to update the top header on this site... and the whole theme, honestly. (It's been four years! About time for a remake, I think.) People really hate the color scheme on this site, although I have to say I kind of like it. But I also like the terrible MacPaint-ass theme on my personal website, so what do I know?

Applet, as always under the cut. Enjoy!

#44: I Was Never Book Smart. I'm Money Smart. (Themeless #20)

 

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If you saw the title of this post and the image attached to it and felt a guilty little twinge of recognition, perhaps this 68-word themeless is up your alley! If you didn't, well... I guess there might be something in it for you anyway, although you might need to look up 31-Across on Know Your Meme afterwards. Suffice it to say that this puzzle conforms to every single QVXwordz stereotype: Scrabbly, packed with pop culture garbage, and rather difficult. But it's a fun puzzle anyway. Give it a spin!

Although, of course, no one is saying you have to do my puzzle. (Well, I'm saying it, but no one else is saying it.) So many good puzzles come out these days! I was recently flabbergasted by a pair of themelesses from old pros: Brendan Emmett Quigley's first blog puzzle of the year is a stellar super-low-word-count grid, and over at the New Yorker Erik Agard casually dropped a gorgeous puzzle that looks like a butterfly and solves like a bee, so to speak. (Actually, it's a wildly clean fill of a wildly open grid shape - as if he saw one of those grids where two stagger stacks cross and said "hold my beer.") And did you hear that there's a new charity pack out there? Puzzles for Palestine dropped over the weekend! A small donation to the Palestinian Children's Relief Fund will get you 22 puzzles by an all-star team of constructors - what a steal! I test-solved some of these grids and they are, in fact, quite worth your money.

Applet under the cut, as usual. No one test solved this, so there is one somewhat obvious typo in the PDF that will not affect your solving experience. Have fun!

#43: Back Me Up Here, Y'all (Themeless #19)

 

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This puzzle is a 68-word themeless, with a bunch of things about it that are impressive in the XWordInfo sense - yes, as that thumbnail shows, there's a triple stack of 15s in its center, and also, without giving anything away, let's just say that this puzzle is an equal opportunity employer of consonants and vowels. It is also a fairly difficult puzzle, particularly if you're not on my wavelength - I packed this one full of references to popular culture that I like, some of which are not particularly mainstream. (Tragically for 34-Down, winning the Record of the Year Latin Grammy does not make you "white famous," nor does it make you "crossworthy," and, yes, I am pretending that the latter is not code for the former.) But I think the songs and records name-dropped here are worth a listen - hence why once you solve the puzzle there'll be links to all the songs I namedropped. Maybe someday I'll make a Spotify playlist with all the songs I namedropped in these puzzles? Would require me to have a Spotify account, so probably not. (Now, a last.fm playlist... haha, just kidding. Or am I?)

Incredibly, I have gone something like 15 months without posting a themeless on this blog. Weirdly, this is not because 2023 was a fallow year for me puzzle-wise, since I made at least fifty midis for Crossword Club alone. (I like the one I did from this Tuesday, incidentally.) Oh, and I got a grid published in the New York Times, finally. Twice, actually! Really, 2023 was a banner year for me in puzzles. I got to work behind the scenes at ACPT! I was (briefly) in the top 5 at Boswords and Lollapuzzoola!! Robyn Weintraub hugged me like, a dozen times!!!

But yes, QVXwordz has been sadly neglected over the past couple months. That's why my lofty goal for 2024 is to go "fifty-fifty" - by which I mean, I'm aiming to get fifty full-sized puzzles on the blog this year, and to sell fifty full-sized puzzles to various outlets. And you can help with that - I'm looking to collaborate with as many constructors as is feasible this year. So why don't you (is she gonna say the thing? is she gonna say the thing?) back me up here, y'all? Shoot me an e-mail and say "hey, Q, let's make a puzzle together!" and we'll work something out.

Anyway, hope you all like this puzzle. Big ups to John Kugelman and RandomSaucepan for testing this one. I'm still working out a schedule for weekly-ish posting - when I started the blog the only indie site that regularly posted on Thursdays was BEQ's, but now I'm wondering whether I should start posting on the weekend? We'll see.

#42: Toy Story

 

(insert sid's grids joke here)
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difficulty: medium

Pretty self-explanatory why this puzzle's theme was a no-go everywhere I sent it - and no, I don't mean because it's a... well, you'll see. Lyle Broughton, champion of reality TV and Bananagrams variants, did due diligence test solving this one (and confirmed for me the title on this one isn't too dupe-y).

I have a couple puzzles coming out in very exciting places this month, so keep your eyes peeled for those. Also, maybe check out my weekly midi for Crossword Club? I usually have the Thursday grid there; I like this puzzle I did for them today. Will Nediger discontinued his indie highlights series, irritatingly, which means I'll have to pick up the slack on those going forward, so I guess I'll post that this weekend. And then... maybe back to regular posting on this here site? Why not.

Anyway, applet under the cut. Enjoy.

#41: Strip Poker

 

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difficulty: medium

Somewhat belated puzzle, as hinted at by the vestiges of Halloween theming. Thanks to Brian Thomas and Will Eisenberg for testing this one!

I've had a lot of irons in the fire (including one that, when I can say it, will be of interest to all of you interested in puzzles bearing my imprint). Well, I had the November 15 Crossword Club puzzle, which was quite good, and due to the vagaries of our publication schedule there I'll also have tomorrow's grid. More excitingly, I also have a puzzle in this month's Lemonade Disco suite, edited by Taylor Johnson. I love Taylor's willingness to arrange these community projects - it's nice to see the return of a bit of the indie spirit that has been sorely missing from crosswords these days, even amidst the Puzzle Boom. Somewhat relatedly, I was not involved with its creation, but I loved this Ocean's Eleven themed cryptic by the Rackenfracker.

OK, puzzle under the cut. Love y'all.

#40: There Was an Attempt (ft. Riley Wise)

 

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difficulty: medium (like a Wednesday NYT)

I don't know why it is that when you make a puzzle for a real venue, one that will pay you and everything, it takes literal months of back-and-forth and grid iterations before you get something even remotely decent, but that when you shitpost, you can create a complete and clean and good grid in thirty minutes. Such is the case with this puzzle, co-constructed by myself and Riley Wise. Lila test solved this mess, god bless her. I'll edit in the .puz file when I figure out how to get a certain aspect of the grid to work in .puz form. Anyway, applet under the cut - enjoy!

(P.S.: Did you do my AVCX grid from yesterday? It was called Monster Mash and literally everyone loved it!)

#39: For Sexy MFs Only (Themeless #18)

 

difficulty: middling (Friday)
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The dulcet tones of the Lady Miss Kier can only mean one thing - the return of QVXwordz themelesses! Holy shit!

Not too much to say here. Astute solvers will note that this puzzle has 74 words, which is too many for the majority of crossword outlets; I estimate that at least one of the clues/entries here is a no-go at most crossword outlets, too. (Hint: it's the one that says MOTHAFUCKIN' in all caps.) Thanks to Ben, Josh, and Riley for test-solving.

Puzzle under the cut! Although, I've also included a fullscreen link above in lieu of a PDF (which you can just make with the Amuselabs applet anyway), in case you want to solve it that way. Have fun!

#38: The One with the Deez Nuts Reference (Themeless #17)

 

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difficulty: medium

Just a quick themeless built around a (chef's kiss) perfect northwest corner. Not a lot to say about this one, other than that I tried to make it pretty straightforward relative to the regular QVXwordz themeless, which skews towards the very difficult.

Did you guys do the awesome Yacob Yonas themeless I edited for AVCX? You should! It's great! Oh, also, there's a great book of Inkubator puzzles that's coming out next month, and I have a puzzle in it!! I don't have a puzzle in These Puzzles Fund Abortion II but it's a great pack of puzzles for a good cause, so if you haven't donated for that, do that too. OK, applet below the cut, hope you love it!

#37: Hey, it's Q Vasquez

 

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difficulty: easy-ish (Tuesday)

Lots of exciting personal news: first of all, me and Kaybart won the pairs division at the Boswords Winter Wondersolve, which was great - both our unexpected victory and the four puzzles themselves which were unsurprisingly brilliant. (But how could they not be, with a line-up like Kate Chin Park, Christina Iverson, Ade Koiko, and Matthew Stock!?!?) Registration is now open for the Boswords Spring Themeless League, which will be similarly great.

Even more exciting: after a successful Kickstarter, the AVCX's expansion is kicking off tomorrow, so for the low cost of $30 a year you will be getting daily-ish content from some of the best people in the crossword game. Including myself, both as a constructor and as an editor of various themeless puzzles. So yes - two midis, a themed puzzle, a themeless, a cryptic, and a trivia game! Every week, more or less. For $30. If you aren't subscribed, you're missing out!

Anyway - here's a slightly belated puzzle. It's the best sort of puzzle: a puzzle where you'll either not get the theme at all or get the theme and *hate* it. Hope you like it despite that. Applet under the cut.

#36: The Black and White Puzzle (Themeless #16) (ft. Kate Chin Park)

 

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difficulty: medium-hard

Don'tcha love Kate Chin Park? Did you know that Kate is constructing a puzzle for Boswords' Winter Wondersolve? You should register for that, IMO. If you go to the Boswords website and register right now you can see a picture of Kate squirming in pain as she puts ketchup on a burrito.

Kate and I did this puzzle a couple months ago and I am posting it here now because, quote, "guesting on your blog really ups my cred." (Lies! But I'll take the compliment.) Anyway she's the best, this puzzle is very good, etc etc. Please enjoy; applet under the cut.

#35 (Sweet Goodbyes): Exit West (by Parker Higgins) (Guest Post) (Grid Charlemagne)

 

(yes, i know not scoring this puzzle with the dan is blasphemy, but i don't want to spoil the grid)

difficulty: medium
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You know a puzzle with four distinct parentheticals in the title is going to be a doozy. So here it is: a puzzle by everyone's favorite human, Parker "xor" Higgins. Among other things, Parker co-hosts the stream Cursewords Live with the equally attractive Ross Trudeau; runs a Twitter bot that posts train emoji every couple hours; and, most importantly for those of you keeping up with QVXwordz lore, has split mango mochi with me and Brooke Husic. What a king!

Parker notes:

It's an honor and a pleasure to have the opportunity to offer a contribution to the "Grid Charlemagne" movement. Thank you to Quiara for hosting me among her uniformly excellent puzzles, to Adam Aaronson for kicking off this whole Grid Charlemagne business, and to Walter and Donald for the music.

Well, that's it from me. I'll see you all next Monday with the... yes, I know I promised there'd be a Monday Mini *last* week. Please don't make a running gag out of this. Applet, as always, under the cut.

#34b: Babysitting Dragons (Themeless #15)

 

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difficulty: hard

Double Dragon pt. 2. Not a lot to say on this one, other than that you should check out the puzzle Ada Nicolle and Jenna LaFleur did together which I shamelessly stole the layout on this puzzle from. Thank you to the test solvers on this one and the previous one. Ajay, Kate, Will E., um, Noah I think, some other people? This past week was a blur. Our bathroom doesn't work, it's a whole thing. A whole smelly thing. I'm glad you can't smell me over Zoom. OK, bye, hope you likey, applet under the cut; mini next week, I pinky swear.

#34a: Chasing the Dragon

 

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difficulty: hard-ish

I am holding a mystical sphere, etc etc. Not a "Grid Charlemagne," despite the associated tune (that's next week, hopefully). This is one half of a pair of puzzles I'm releasing together called "Double Dragon." They're not really connected beyond their titles, and a slight bit of Gamer Girl content in both. This is the themed one of the two; it might be a little niche, but it's fine, I bet. Have fun. Applet, as always, beneath the cut.

THE QVXWORDZ FIRST ANNIVERSARY THROWBACK SPECTACULAR

 

This Thursday marked the one-year anniversary of QVXwordz, and I wanted to do something nostalgic to celebrate - so, here are some puzzles I QVXcavated for you.

Back at the start of the pandemic, when I lost my job and couldn't leave the house, I decided that I'd go insane if I didn't do *something,* and out of the blue one of my friends mentioned he'd been using a program called Phil to make his own crosswords online. After a couple months, I had finally made a pair of 15x grids that I thought were good enough to share with friends, so I sent them to this guy whose puzzles I had been enjoying. And that guy's name was Sid... something or other. I think he has a website, the name of which eludes me at the moment? Whatever. Anyway, Sid Something-or-other said he liked my puzzles, and got me in touch with Matthew Stock, who got me in touch with Erik Agard, and before you know it I'm the hottest girl in all of crossworld, getting commissions left and right, I'm published in all sorts of newspapers, etc etc. So you know, not to undersell my mad skillz, but let's take this opportunity to give thanks to Erik, and Matthew, and Sid - all famously wonderful guys, as anyone remotely familiar with the world of indie puzzles will attest - without whom I'd likely not be the phenom I am today.

And you know, let's add one more name to that list of giants whose shoulders I stand upon - Phil creator Keiran King. Keiran, are you reading this? You rock, and I literally would not be making puzzles at the level I am today if I hadn't chanced upon your site. Seriously, man, hit me up. Let's collab on a grid sometimes. I owe you my career, arguably.

Right, anyway: under the cut you'll find the first two 15x puzzles I ever made that approach "solvable." I'm selling myself short, actually - these are pretty damn good, considering I had no idea what a ""wordlist"" even was at the time. They got the Sid Something-or-other seal of approval way back when, which is no mean feat. So let's go. Here's to one year of QVXwordz, bitches. Applets below the cut; see you next week.

 

#33: It'll Make You Say "Oh" (Smoother Version) (Themeless #14)

 

 

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difficulty: "smooth"

Hello to the many, many people who just solved my Boswords puzzle! I hope you had as much fun solving it as I did making it. If you're looking for some more fun puzzles on this site, well, anything on the front page is worth a go, but also consider checking out the following grids of mine:

- Themeless #7 on this website, which as I mentioned during Boswords has six intersecting spanners.
- Take a Stab on Crucinova, a themeless with a truly wild grid shape.
- This themed puzzle I did for The Atlantic with some distinctly 21st century entries.

If this puzzle looks familiar, it's because you might have solved it before elsewhere - specifically, you might have done it two months ago when the grid appeared as a guest spot on Tim Croce's website. But in the spirit of Boswords, I've decided to make an alternate version of the grid with much easier clues. If you're a Stormy level solver, by all means, give Tim your traffic and try that version of the puzzle instead!

As for this puzzle, Kelsey and Frisco kindly test-solved this clue; thanks to them both. Applet under the cut; two new puzzles (!!) this Thursday, plus maybe a guest puzzle!? We'll see. Love y'all.

#32: Pod Casting

 

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difficulty: medium

Totally '90s tribute puzzle this week. Big shout-out to my mom, whose subscription to AARP Magazine - usually an alarming reminder of the mortality of the most important woman in my life - gave me a great cluing angle this week. And while we're here, let's also give a shout-out to my wonderful boyfriend, who watched me sketch this grid out on the back of a newspaper mumbling phrases to myself like "pinwheel arrangement" and "optimal initial Js" while sitting cross-legged on a stool at a pizza parlor and thought, "yes, I am going to continue dating this woman." And hey, shout-out to you for sitting through this crap too, when you could be doing the latest Brooke Husic puzzle instead. Just kidding, you can do both. (Please do Brooke's latest, it's awesome.)

Anyway, applet under the cut. I'll have a "bonus puzzle" for y'all on Monday. (Don't get too excited, it's just a rerun. Uh, not a "rerun" per se. You'll see.) Enjoy.