I’m going to start with the devil’s advocate point of view and quote Jonathan Crowther (the Azed setter at the Observer) in his A-Z of crosswords: “in my experience the ability to solve crosswords comes from practice rather than from diligent application to ‘how-to’ books, though these clearly have their place”. Is he right? Well my own experience was of roughly 10 years of practice before I sat down and read a “how-to” book properly. That was the first edition of Don Manley’s book. The effect of reading it was to clarify what was going on, and to speed up my solving considerably once I understood some aspects of the precision involved in the clues, which I’d not previously appreciated. Inside you will find a varied selection of puzzles, including crosswords, word searches, word ladders, anagrams, sudokus, spot-the-differences, acrostics and more! Alongside a selection of enchanting affirmations to awaken your imagination and inspire creativity

A recent (end of 2009) book from Colin Dexter, which has some useful advice but misses out some pretty basic points and includes some poor clues. Colin Dexter should have been able to write a book as good as Moorey and Manley, but didn’t. Immerse yourself in all things mystical with this assortment of pleasing puzzles and calming conundrums, guaranteed to bewitch and enchant you. Most of these will help, but they vary in the extent to which the description of clues precisely matches what the setters say they are doing, and the quality of the detailed analysis. As above, the ones that seem best to me are listed first. Val Gilbert was Daily Telegraph crossword editor for about 30 years, so she’s well-qualified to write a book which I assume (I don’t own this one) is aimed at the Telegraph puzzle in particular.

Another one which I don’t own but I believe does a sound job. Both authors have set Listener puzzles, and Knight is “Mordred” in current Independent puzzles. I’d suggest one of the first three is your best choice if your main aim is to learn to solve the Daily Telegraph puzzle. The next three are perfectly OK, the last one is a gamble. Fairly brief coverage of clue types, with lots of sample puzzles and answers which include explanations. But written in Australia and based on the rather pedestrian puzzles that seem to dominate the market there.

Discover the wonders of the paranormal with this collection of spellbinding puzzles and brain-training activities, here to focus your mind and inspire creativity. Word Fills in the correct word for the space or clue you’ve highlighted. If you use a Hint, you won’t get a ranking.