The Amazon Guide to Cryptic Crosswords

For everyone who has been baffled, bemused and bewildered by those seemingly incomprehensible clues to cryptic crosswords Jack Dunwoody has put together a new book on solving Cryptic Crosswords by understanding how they are compiled, and learning what words mean in a Cryptic Sense as opposed to what they mean in a dictionary or thesaurus. Jack's goal in this book is to place the would-be solver on more even terms with the compiler and, having gained this unique insight into how a cryptic crossword compiler's mind works, thus enhance his or her prospect and enjoyment of solving cryptic puzzles . Jack was born in Comber, County Down, Northern Ireland in 1941 and was educated at Regent House School and Queens University, Belfast. His entire working career was spent in the IT industry, originally in his native Ireland, then in Tanzania and Kenya and finally in South Africa, where from 1975 to 2005.he held a number of managerial positions and directorships in Cape Town and Johannesburg. Jack married Kathleen in Ireland in 1963 before embarking on his first overseas posting in 1966. They live in Cape Town, South Africa and have two children, Jonathan in Durban, South Africa and Kellie in Wiltshire, UK; and five grandchildren, Bradley, Robyn, Grace, Jessica and Honor. Jack's first crosswords were encountered during schooldays and were invariably of the simple synonym variety, referred to as concise crosswords. Infrequent and private glances at the complicates clues of cryptic crosswords, however, did not offer a reasonable enough prospect of success. To an achievement-oriented youngster the risk of failure and the resultant blow to the ego count not be contemplated! His conversion to cryptic crosswords was therefore somewhat of an accident during an Air Training Corps camp in 1958 at Hornchurch in Essex. The accident was missing the last train from London, the place was Trafalgar Square, the reason was trying to pass the time until morning. An English cadet, in the same dilemma, proceeded to do the cryptic crossword in a discarded newspaper and had enough time (all night) and interest (they only had one newspaper) to explain the quirks employed by the cryptic compiler to baffle the uninitiated. And so began a love affair with cryptic crosswords that has followed Jack around the world. Jack has been compiling the weekly cryptic crosswords for South Africa's leading financial magazine FINWEEK since 2003, having been tasked then to deliver puzzles at a challenge level consistent with those of the London Financial Times. A number of cryptic crossword books were to follow and an ebook Cryptic Crosswords - How a Compiler Thinks. Although Jack is compiling his puzzles in South Africa they follow all the characteristics of British cryptic puzzles constructed in the UK and he is generally regarded as South Africa's premier cruciverbalist.