Crossword Help Forum
Forum Rules

Thank you Quisling and Brendan. Really appreciated

Enough time has passed for me to seek help. I have 10 thematic words, and thus 10 part-messages. Usually any missing letters can be guessed, but not this time. Nor can I spot anything thematic. I would welcome a hint about the thematic nature.

Cockle, the 'description' given by the letters on the right, isn't in English...

Not sure that helps much, malone. The thematic thing might help (or a hint, that is). There are a lot of extraneous words which don't look thematic: "supplying" in 15, for example. It's there only for the surface.

THanks, Cockle, I wondered if that was a bit too miserly! The extra wotds in 13A, 19 A, 27 A were a big help, many others were much more obscure. Think of geographical features....

You could try a bit of grid staring, cockie, but not horizontal or vertical. Something might look familiar

I enjoyed this, especially smugly writing down the thematic answers without having to look them up.
But I don't get the significance of the "letters to the left" - they didn't help me at all. What have I missed?

They form an instruction which completes the phrase begun by the letters to the right, biggus56

Hi Biggus,

The letters to the left, when read in reverse order, tell you how to adjust another word to get the last word of the phrase spelt by the letters to the right.

If I am to sleep tonight (unlikely given all the comings and goings in SW1) I would appreciate a little guidance. I have 11 special clues - 5 Across (product 10,116,873) and 6 down (236,670). Am I right so far, and what am I missing? I can see a thematic connection among most of the extra words, but not all. The earlier hint about the first three thematic clues leads to an interesting place, but I don't seem to progress any further.