Across the Universe: The Past, Present, and Future of the Crossword Puzzle

New Yorker crossword constructor Last debuts with an enthusiastic if uneven exploration of the crossword puzzle. He gives an expansive overview of the game’s history, from its 1913 origins—it was at first dubbed a “Word-Cross”—to the New York Times’s ongoing domination (even though the Times rejected crosswords as “unserious, even dangerous” until WWII). The many angles the book takes include an astute look at present-day “dissatisfaction with [the game’s] editing norms” for skewing white and male; an overview of technological innovations, from ’90s audiotext clue hotlines (1-900-884-CLUE) to today’s AI crossword solvers; and an entertaining account of the 1920s crossword craze, which generated delightfully bizarre cultural spinoffs—like novelty song “Cross-Word Mamma, You Puzzle Me”—as well as comparisons between the viral crossword phenomenon and the flu. However, Last’s own crossword craze leads him to make some big stretches, such as equating crosswords with modernist literature and fantasizing, in exhaustive detail, about the wall text at an imaginary exhibition of crossword maker Elizabeth Gorski’s work (“In Gorski’s hands, these grids... gesture at the grandiose”). The book charms most when Last shows crosswords bringing people together: adult siblings who bond over crosswords when caring for their ailing mother; a woman who completes her late father’s folder of half-finished crosswords in “a collaboration across time.” It’s a meandering love letter best suited for fellow obsessives. (Nov.)