Lesson 3 How Clues Get Tougher Throughout the Week

Lesson 3 How Clues Get Tougher Throughout the Week

Many of the same common words appear in crosswords throughout the week. The clues will be fairly straightforward in an easy Monday or Tuesday puzzle, but as the difficulty level ratchets up during the week, the same basic words will have much trickier clues.

One of the most common 4-letter answers is AREA. At the beginning of the week, clues tend to be direct synonyms: [Region], [District], [Neighborhood], [Locale]. Mid-week, clues are a little tougher: [It may be gray], [Plane measure], [Geometry calculation]. By the time Friday and Saturday roll around, the clues may include less common synonyms, such as [Purlieu] or [Vicinage]; have many possible answers, as in [Country statistic]; be rather vague, such as [It may be restricted];or involve wordplay, like [Side by side, maybe?].

Entries that don’t lend themselves to wordplay and interpretation can be clued easy or hard depending on the choice of factual details.

ERIE might simply be clued as [Cleveland’s lake] on Monday, requiring basic knowledge of Midwestern geography. For a Wednesday puzzle, the solver may be expected to have a deeper knowledge of history to decode [War of 1812 battle site]. In a Friday or Saturday crossword, the clue for ERIE may rely on more oblique facts: [Where 1-79 ends] or [Gannon University locale].

OLEO is another common crossword entry. On Monday or Tuesday, it might be clued simply as [Margarine], [Bread spread] or [Butter substitute]. Midweek, the puns roll in (as in [Pat on the buns?]) and the solver needs to think flexibly about the clues— [Food item sold in bars] doesn’t pertain to a tavern’s menu! By Friday and Saturday, the clues will be less specific, such as [Spread], or more devious, as with [Promise kept in a tub, perhaps].