Puzzles

Puzzlesnacks

Snack-sized puzzles for beginning and intermediate solvers, from kids to adults. Not too easy, but never too hard. Get a free puzzle every month at puzzlesnacks.com, or subscribe to have weekly puzzles sent to your inbox, along with lots of bonus puzzles.

Also, get the first Puzzlesnacks collection from Simon & Schuster — more info here.

Past Projects

Click to read the various case studies.

• Escape The Ballroom (American Crossword Puzzle Tournament)
• Escape From the Haunted Library (Connecticut Library Association)
• Quests in the Enchanted Forest (Milford Public Library)
• Catch That Ghost! (The National Museum of Mathematics)
• The Farm-to-Table Puzzles (The Stepping Stones Children’s Museum)
• Paging Dr. Enigma (The Hackley School)
• The Social Distancing Puzzles (charity event for Feeding America)
• Puzzles for Democracy (charity event for Common Cause)
• Rule The Word! (Scripps National Spelling Bee)
  

Crosswords

New York Times
I’ve had close to 50 crosswords and variety puzzles in the New York Times.

• My first-ever NYT crossword: “Components” (June 23, 2002)
  
• A crossword co-constructed with “Weird Al” Yankovic: “The Cheesy Film Festival” (April 4, 2018)

Crossword Suites
A bunch of puzzles on a particular theme.

• A Crossword Lover’s Salute to “Mad Magazine” (2004)
• A Tournament Grows in Brooklyn (2008): Commissioned by Will Shortz for the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament.
• Game Night Crosswords (2009): The sixth-ever project funded on Kickstarter. 

Variety Puzzles

I try to bring an original puzzle to each year’s convention of the National Puzzlers’ League. Here are the handouts from the last few years:

• 2021: Patchwork
• 2020: Mad Dash
• 2019: Puzzle of the Day
• 2018: Ninefold Path (and then some)
• 2017: Wry Tangles
• 2016: Ninefold Path
• 2014: Palindrome Wannabes
• 2013: Circular Reasoning

Other Stuff

• Puzzled Pint: A suite of five easyish variety puzzles created for this monthly puzzle event, held in pubs and bars worldwide.
• Palindrome Practice Hunts: My Mystery Hunt team, Palindrome, makes a small “practice hunt” each year. Two are available: Ya Buncha Yo-Yos and Damn This Traffic Jam.
• Intercoastal Altercations 5: An online puzzle event run in October of 2011.
  • My puzzles: A Word From Our Sponsor, Safe, Adjustments to the Lineup, Hardball, Tools of the Trade, ..And the Pitch.
• BAPHL of the Bands: Run in Boston, MA, in September of 2012.
  • My puzzles: Fun Size, Calendar Guy, Close Enough For Jazz.