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SUNDAY PUZZLE — Will Shortz, in his print introduction to this grid, writes: “Hoang-Kim Vu, of Washington, D.C., works in global public health. This is his 10th crossword for The New York Times — fitting, given the theme! — and his first Sunday. He wanted a theme that made full use of the larger grid, which resulted in this ambitious and impressive interlock. As a born-and-bred New Jerseyan, he hopes solvers will excuse 34-Down, with which he’s ‘probably more comfortable’ than most.”

Once you’re done with this grid, take a step back and observe it as a whole. The skill involved in its construction is dazzling.

Today’s Theme

I tend to circle Sunday puzzles for a bit to let a theme swim into focus, rather than homing in on it from the get-go. (It’s kind of like eating your favorite thing on a plate last, which not everyone does, if you can believe it.) So I was the perfect customer for what Mr. Vu was selling here: a subtle theme set of unclued letter runs that not only share a category, but also follow a strict sequence as they make their way down the grid. When it clicked for me, it was a stellar aha moment.

You will notice that 10 clues, at 1-, 25-, 32-, 48-, 61-, 72-, 81-, 109-, 116- and 121-Down, consist simply of a hyphen. Those are the only obvious components of a theme set. I imagine that some solvers figured out their common trait by filling out one or two using crossing letters, but that was not my experience.

Instead, I found myself bemused and confused by a couple of seemingly unrelated Across entries. First of all, at 24-Across, “It might help you keep up with old classmates,” I got ALUMNWS LETTER, which was a letter away from satisfying me. I’d have accepted “alumnus letter” here. I was sure about that “W” though, from 11-Down, “Edward Jenner used it when developing the world’s first successful vaccine,” which I knew was COWPOX. I entertained the notion of a letter swap here; “U” for “W” had wordplay potential. And I filled in the “N” in ALUMNWS without thinking about the entry that it begins, which is 25-Down — it didn’t even catch my eye.

Then, at 108-Across, “Concern at the end of a space journey,” I was flummoxed. I got EAR __ NTRY, which made me briefly think of eustachian tubes and whether astronauts’ ears pop during an, um, “ear entry.”

But that was too much of a reach to be possible, and at this point I had arrived at 71-Across. I consider it the clearest example of the theme set because of how it’s organized. The clue is “Break for a bit”; I got the first four letters, T-A-K-E, on crosses, and the final square is also the first square of 72-Down. I had a couple of letters crossing that entry and realized that it was FIVE, which finished the thought started at 71-Across. Start with T-A-K-E-F, finish with I-V-E, reading down. Now, I had TAKE FIVE, or “Break for a bit,” and an idea of what those hyphen clues might be.

Returning to ALUMNWSLETTER, I saw right away that if 25-Down were NINE, I would have a much more sensible ALUMNI NEWSLETTER. And if 109-Down were THREE, 108-Across would be EARTH REENTRY.

It still took a moment to dawn on me that the single digits were all in this grid, represented by the hyphens in the clues. It took another moment to grasp that those numbers appeared in order, from 10 to one, starting at 1-Down with TEN and ending in the next-to-final entry, 121-Down, with ONE. What a brilliant “Countdown,” as the puzzle is aptly titled!

Tricky Clues

38A. For “Certain porter,” I thought of a beer, a stout, a lager — nothing fit. The answer is a term for a railroad porter that has been around since the 19th century, a REDCAP.

7D. This entry is a pun: “One taking interest in your education?” is SALLIE MAE, a company that was started by Congress in 1972 and has cornered the market on student loans (check out those interest rates, and seethe a little). This is a debut, and if you don’t know it, you’re lucky, old or both.

10D. I imagine manual typewriters and a plush old office when I think of this anachronistic entry: “Heaps at publishing houses” solves to SLUSH PILES. People used to send manila folders with manuscripts and self-addressed envelopes through the mail, unsolicited. Poring through them was a hazing ritual for editorial assistants, but you never know! Works by Martha Grimes and Tom Clancy, of all people, were slush pile discoveries.

36D. “Landed on a licorice space in Candy Land, say,” is highly specific trivia: When it happens to you while you’re playing this board game, it means that you’ve LOST A TURN.

71D. This clue roused an odd memory for me that seems to be predigital, perhaps from an old Foxfire magazine: “Birch bark and pine cones, e.g.,” makes me think of descriptions of outhouses. (I think the pine cones were décor, not functional.) The answer is also old-fashioned. They’re TINDERS, for lighting a wood stove or something like that.

Constructor Notes

This grid was a bit of a bear to construct in a way that was still relatively smooth but also felt true to the puzzle’s conceit (i.e. progressing in order, in a way that would be read naturally left to right and top down), given how interconnected all of the theme answers would end up being. So to do that, some trade-offs were necessary, like giving solvers a leg up from the jump at 1-Down and having a less hidden version of the theme at 71-Across. Also, my apologies in advance to all French speakers — though especially to my mom — for using the Anglicized, but grammatically incorrect, version of 80-Across. All that said, I was really happy with how the whole thing turned out and hope you enjoyed it!

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