Novelty Crosswords: Missing Vowel Puzzles
The puzzle is presented as a normal crossword, but with a novel twist: instead of orthodox clues, all the answers appear under the grid, BUT without their vowels. This may sound like a fairly simple puzzle, but actually it can be really tricky.
There are two difficult elements to solving these puzzles:
Firstly, it can be hard to think of words that fit a pattern when you are only given the consonants.
Secondly, there might be lots of options, and so it is tricky to work out that you have found all possible options, and also therefore it can be hard to solve areas of the grid with confidence.
As a first step, you might like to go through and see if there are words you think only have one answer. Unlike anagram crosswords that you should start solving by tackling the shortest answers, with missing vowel / vowelless crosswords, you should start with the longest answers, as these usually have fewer valid options than the shorter words, and they are usually easier to spot.
You will definitely have several answers you can't solve immediately due to the number of possible options, so therefore your eye will need to look for clues with a unique answer to get you started.
Where you find there are several answers, be sure to consider if all options have certain letters in the same place: if so then you can place these in the grid, which might help you with other answers. Simple tactics like this are easy to spot but can make solving quite a bit easier, and not everyone uses them to maximum effect.
And that is all there is to solving vowelless crosswords. How do you find them; do you like this puzzle type and would you like to see more of them? Share your thoughts on missing vowel crosswords in the comments section as we'd be interested in hearing your thoughts on this crossword variant.
Date written: 27 Mar 2015
Comment on this post
You must be logged in to comment - please Register or Login
Dictionaries And Help With Writing Crossword Clues
For anyone who has written crossword clues, or anyone who is about to, there is one great realisation that dawns on you fairly on in your clue-writing career: dictionaries are surprisingly ineffective at helping you write crossword clues.
There are...
Added: 28 Apr 2015
Introduction To Wordwheel Puzzles
Word wheel puzzles are one of the simplest of all word puzzles, and belong to the set of word puzzles that are, essentially, anagrams.
If you have ever played the game Countdown, then you will know the aim is to find the single longest word you can...
Added: 25 Mar 2015
Homophone Clues In Cryptic Crosswords
Cryptic crossword clues, as you'll have seen through this series of blog posts, come in various distinct types, and the list we've covered is not even exhaustive!
One of the clue types that people often struggle with is the homophone clue, or...
Added: 13 Apr 2015
General Knowledge Solving Tips
Solving general knowledge puzzles, surprisingly enough, requires a considerable amount of general knowledge. So far, so obvious. But how do you go about getting the knowledge that you require to solve a general knowledge crossword?
Well there are...
Added: 20 Mar 2015
Why Are Crosswords So Popular?
One question that is often asked is why are crosswords so popular? The same question is also applied to the other famous word puzzle, the wordsearch, and also to the relative newcomer on the block in the world of logic puzzles (not number puzzles!) - the...
Added: 08 Apr 2015
Back to Puzzle Blog
Puzzle Types:
