NPR Sunday Puzzle (Dec 3): Sacramento Anagrams

NPR Sunday Puzzle (Dec 3): Sacramento Anagrams:

Q: Take the name 'Sacramento,' the capital of California. Re-arrange these 10 letters to spell two words that are synonyms.

A: SCENT and AROMA

NPR Sunday Puzzle (Nov 26): Giving Lots of Thanks

NPR Sunday Puzzle (Nov 26): Giving Lots of Thanks:

Q: Name a well-known American city, with 12 letters in its name, containing the letters of THANKS in left to right order, not necessarily consecutively. A hint: This is a city of more than 100,000 people. What city is it?

Thanksgiving is putting me in a giving mood, so I'll give you a link to a List of U.S. Cities by Population. That should be very helpful for solving this week's puzzle.

A: THOUSAND OAKS in Southern California

NPR Sunday Puzzle (Nov 19): A Political Scramble...

NPR Sunday Puzzle (Nov 19): A Political Scramble...:

Name a famous person in American politics, five letters in the first name, six letters in the last. You can rearrange this to spell the names of two countries, one of them five letters and the other six. The five-letter one is the current name of a country, the six letter one is an old name for a country, but both are well known. Who is the politician and what are the countries?

This person has been in the news recently. And one extra hint, one of the countries is in Asia.

Edit: I had to look through old names of countries to remember that Sri Lanka's former name (pre-1952) was Ceylon. Looking at the letters, Nancy just popped into my head and I got the answer.

A: NANCY PELOSI --> SPAIN and CEYLON

NPR Sunday Puzzle (Nov 12): Lots of Lather...

NPR Sunday Puzzle (Nov 12): Lots of Lather... to clean one's conscience?:

Q: Take the word lather. Rearrange the letters and repeat them as often as necessary to name a famous literary work in 16 letters. Hint: The title of this literary work has three words, one of which is hyphenated. Name this famous literary work.

My son had recently gone on a class field trip and coincidentally they had seen this story performed as a play. Looking at the letters of 'lather' it was pretty apparent that 'THE' would be part of the title. I was the first to come up with the longest part of the title and then the other word, beating everyone else to the punch. I'll post the answer after the Thursday deadline.

Edit: The hidden clue above was "beating everyone to the punch"... beating, beating, beating...

A: Edgar Allan Poe's THE TELL-TALE HEART

NPR Sunday Puzzle (Nov 5): Writer Turned Detective

NPR Sunday Puzzle (Nov 5): Writer Turned Detective

Q: Name a well-known writer of the 20th century, now deceased... an author of bestselling non-fiction. There are six letters in the first name and six in the last. Remove the letter 'C' somewhere from this name. The remaining letters can be rearranged to name a famous fictional detective with four letters in the first name and seven in the last. What names are these?

I will be honest that I didn't figure this out before the deadline passed. Certainly the author did write a famous book, but it is hard to classify someone as an "author of bestselling non-fiction" based on a single book. Anyway here is the answer:

A:
RACHEL CARSON - zoologist and marine biologist whose landmark book, Silent Spring (about pesticide use, especially DDT), is often credited with having launched the global environmental movement.
NORA CHARLES - From the Dashiell Hammett novel "The Thin Man", Nick Charles and his wife Nora Charles.