FALLING HAIL: [ ACROSS LITE][ PDF]
PROGRAMS: [Across Lite] [Adobe Reader]
Fun fact, this puzzle was originally used for an Australian crossword tournament. I hear what you’re saying. You’re saying ,”Brendan, I thought they do cryptic style crosswords.” Yeah, they do, but I guess there’s some niche interest in American-style puzzles too. Anyway, my man Liam Runnalls of the Sydney Morning Herald convinced me to make this for the tournament, and supposedly it was the hit of the event. And here we are. So keep that in mind while solving it. And if you’re really clever, you can probably figure out what the original title was.
Share the puzzle. New one on Monday.
A pleasant little solve. Closer to Easy than Medium.
Good on ya mate.
Was the original title something like “Hello Down Under!”?
New to puzzles, can’t make sense of the “fallen letters.”
***Spoiler Alert**
More experienced puzzlers know that they have to suss out how the theme is executed. This theme could mean several things but the “falling” is key. By working this puzzle we learned that “falling” refers to the fact that the 4 theme answers are all Down clues: 3D, 9D, 24D and 26D because those clues do not have enough spaces in the grid to answer them properly. The letters that fall off the grid all relate to the “hail” part of the theme.