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Puzzle Notes
Dear Friends:
Howdy from the AVCX+ crew! We're excited to continue AVCX Hype Week with a themeless 15x15 puzzle by Quiara Vasquez, edited by Sid Sivakumar. It's titled "A Little Black Comedy" and is a moderate 3.5/5 difficulty.
The AVCX+ feature will bring you a *second* full-size standard crossword each week from indie crossword mainstays (whom you may recognize from the puzzle blogosphere and elsewhere), with heavy emphasis on freestyle/themeless puzzles. Solving appetite is stronger now than ever, and with a scarcity of publishing opportunities for themeless puzzles, constructors have too frequently gone unpaid for their outstanding work. We'll aim to fill the void by bringing you fresh themelesses across a range of difficulty levels, from brilliant constructing voices we hope you'll love. (There might also be a cheeky themed puzzle from time to time, for good measure.)
Quiara Vasquez is one-fourth of the AVCX+ editing squad. Her puzzles have appeared in The Atlantic, the Boswords Fall Themeless League, and of course, the AVCX, as well as several print dailies (including USA Today and Newsday). She operates the puzzle blog QVXwordz out of her Brooklyn apartment. Sid Sivakumar is another fourth of the AVCX+ editing team; he also edits The Juggernaut Crossword. He contributes puzzles regularly to The New York Times, and is the constructor behind a (now slightly dusty) puzzle blog by the name of Sid's Grids.
We hope you enjoy the puzzle, and chip in to the Kickstarter campaign if you haven't already. If you have, spread the word! Or contribute as a gift for the puzzlehead in your life. Or both. In any case, we're immensely grateful for your support.
That's all from us! You'll be hearing tomorrow from AVCX Trivia -- we're stoked to see what they've got in store.
Be well,
Sid, Max, Quiara, Chris & the expanded AVCX crew
avxwords.com // @avcxword // @lilavcx // @avcxplus // @avcxtrivia
