Editor's Note: Our British comrade, Sir Jeremy Morse, penned a very complimentary letter on Alpha Sleuth®, Volume 1. He noted that he'd solved all of them fairly easily, but added "the Level 10 held me up a bit"! We, of course, were very interested in hearing his technique. Many of you may know of Jeremy from the financial world. But he's also a respected chess author, and an excellent chess solver and commentator. Here's yet another chance to learn from the best!
How I Solved #V1-47 by Jeremy Morse
1. I established that QU had to start one of the exterior columns. After trying the left-hand one (crossing with, eg. CUP), it seemed unlikely that the 4, the 9, and the (blank) adjoining square could use up three vowels. So I focused on the right-hand one with 7 as a vowel.
2. If 7 and (probably) 4 and 9 were vowels, the second word of the phrase requires 5 to be a consonant: the word's "shape" is CVC??CVVC (C=consonant,V=vowel). The first of the two blanks was more likely to be the fifth vowel, and Y could end any of three across light-words.
3. Z and J would have to start words -- ZAP/ZIP looked promising. And X might follow 7 (in PROXY) or 3.
4. Returning to the phrase, I saw that the second word could be POTENTIAL, so GREAT POTENTIAL.
5. After that it was easy to complete.
The whole process took about 45 minutes. As will be evident, my method followed the recommended
Solving Tips, except that I did not use any solving help.
We thank Jeremy for elaborating on his top-notch technique! Here is the Level 10 solution.
