Extras, Extras!

Difficulty ● ● ◐ ○ ○

Puzzle Notes

Dear Crossword Nation Subscribers:

Before we introduce the latest puzzle, I have important news to share with you. In a few days, Crossword Nation will celebrate 14 years of uninterrupted weekly puzzle offerings. When we launched in June 2011, our goal was to provide fresh, independent puzzles for our subscribers on a weekly basis. Since then, we've had the privilege to serve customers in the United States, Canada and throughout the world.

During recent months, I started hearing from subscribers about email delivery problems -- that our Monday emails constantly ended up in spam folders, or (according to subscribers) were not delivered at all. This was of great concern because our aim was to deliver puzzles in a timely and simple manner. I deeply apologize for those glitches. With each report, we tried to fix the problems, but lately it's been a challenge for me. While I'm eager to troubleshoot delivery and tech details, I find myself devoting more and more time to administrative tasks -- and less time to making the best puzzle products for our customers.

After careful thought, I've decided to end the email delivery service next week. The final puzzle in this series will be No. 731, to be delivered Monday night, June 2, 2025. There's never an ideal time to end a service, but it seemed fitting to start in June and, 14 years later, end in June -- to arrive and leave like a mini Halley's Comet.

Within the next two or three weeks I will contact all subscribers personally with details about full refunds, or partial refunds for unused portions of your subscriptions. Please allow me a few weeks to accomplish this, as it will take a good bit of time. I want to reach out to you personally because many of you have become friends over the years. I'll start contacting you about refunds after the final puzzle is delivered on June 2.

If you have immediate questions, please don't hesitate to write to me at EGorski333@gmail.com

I want to thank each and every one of you for subscribing -- and by definition, for believing in -- this product. It has been a privilege to tiptoe into your living rooms every Monday night, with puzzle in hand.

Though this service is ending, I'm still slingin' crosswords on other continents of the puzzle-sphere. I hope you'll continue to solve my daily puzzles in the L.A. Times (they're free!) and the New Yorker crosswords. This December, my new book of puzzles, Crosswords for Classical Music Lovers, will be released. And there are other puzzle products in the works, so I hope you'll stay in touch by signing up for notifications via the Crossword Nation blog.

Dear Solvers, I will miss our Monday night puzzle traditions. You've been brilliant throughout these 14 years and I thank you for taking the time to solve my puzzles. Next week I'll share some concluding thoughts and thank-you wishes.

Now, let's get on with the show! Welcome to Week 730 of Crossword Nation. Please enjoy "Extras, Extras!" as your new diversion of the week. Happy Solving and Be Well! Until next time, I remain . . .

Cruciverbally yours,

Liz

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Solvers of The New Yorker puzzles: Please check out my most-recent crossword, deemed as "challenging" by the New Yorker editors. 

Mini Crossword Aficionados: For a quick solve, please try the Daily Mini Crossword in the L. A. Times. It's free! Simply bookmark and visit daily for a new puzzle.

Recovering Lost Puzzles: If, for some reason, our weekly puzzle email doesn't appear in your mailbox on Monday evenings, no worries -- you can always "re-send" the puzzle to yourself.

But first ....

  1. Please check the Spam folder. Sometimes the Crossword Nation emails are redirected to Spam folders. This can happen after a software or system update. If it's not in the Spam folder, then try Step 2.
  2. Visit the Subscriber Portal and Re-send the Puzzle To Your Mailbox. You can always send the latest puzzle (or any puzzle from our archive) to yourself. Visit here:

https://xwnation.puzzleanywhere.com/enable-account/

Choose the "Resend Puzzle" link at the bottom right of the page. From there, you can choose which puzzle to send to your mailbox! 

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To Solve Our Puzzles on the Crosswordr site, visit:

https://crosswordr.com/crosswordnation

"To solve Crossword Nation puzzles on Crosswordr, first create a Crosswordr account. After creating the account, please visit the settings page and input your Crossword Nation email and password to ensure you are a subscriber. Crosswordr has an FAQ section dedicated to this setup - if you have questions you can write to: contact@crossplaydigital.com"

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Help Us Stay Strong

If you enjoy our 'indie' Crossword Nation puzzles, please give them a positive review on Amy Reynaldo's blog, Diary of a Crossword Fiend. Your comments help keep our little puzzle shop independent and strong!

Ade Koiki blogs our puzzle every Tuesday. Simply page through Amy's blog to find the Tuesday blog posts. http://crosswordfiend.com/

Happy solving and be well!

Liz Gorski