On Crosswords

“Very Impressive.”
—Will Shortz, the New York Times crossword editor

“On Crosswords by T Campbell honors and explores the totality of crossword puzzles—in our culture and in our hearts and minds. Nobody has put together a Gestaltian analysis like this before. I learned quite a bit from the enjoyable read.”
 —Roy Leban, crossword creator, inventor, founder of Puzzazz

“I very much enjoyed reading this – an impressive and thorough overview of the state of the art, and meticulously documented.  It’ll be a great resource to refer to!”
–Elizabeth Gorski, the New York Times’ most-published creator of Sunday crosswords

On Crosswords covers three major, interrelated topics: crossword history, kinds of crosswords and how crosswords relate to everything else. “Everything else” includes a breathtaking range of topics: marriage proposals, national politics, software development, counterespionage, typography and racism are just some of the high points. Readers will meet the personalities who have made the art form what it is today, and discover the many subspecies of crossword, each with its own personality. And they will walk away with the most complete understanding of the form that any single book can give.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

T Campbell is the author of the world’s largest “New York Times-standard” crossword puzzle, as well as the sci-fi crossword collection Crossworlds and various puzzles in anthologies edited by the nationally syndicated Peter Gordon and Benjamin Tausig. An award-winning editor and author of nine graphic novels, Campbell does the Times crossword every Sunday.