That Word Chat returns December 7 with its second foray into word puzzles with four puzzle-creators from The Inkubator. Audience members will have a chance to buzz in to answer puzzles and compete for fame and prizes (mostly fame).

​

The Inkubator is a subscription-based puzzle site with the mission of providing an outlet for women new to the traditionally male-dominated field. We'll talk with co-founder Laura Braunstein and hear from constructors Katja Brinck, Jess Goldstein, Allegra Kuney, and Quiara Vasquez.

​

Braunstein, a librarian at Dartmouth College, has had puzzles published by The New York Times, Puzzle Society, the Chronicle of Higher Education, and Women of Letters, and is a team member with the American Values Club Crossword. She also blogs for Diary of a Crossword Fiend. When not crossing words, she advocates for open access to scholarship, edits Wikipedia, bikes and skis on mountains, and discusses politics with her kids.

​

Brinck works in IT and lives in Healdsburg, California. She started competing at the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament in 2015 and started constructing in 2018. She has had puzzles appear in the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, the Universal crossword, and other outlets. She is part of the Beyond Wordplay team, where she recently published an article on long German words. Outside of puzzles, she is also into classical piano, skiing, travel, high-impact interval training, hiking, and running.

​

Goldstein is a math teacher and curriculum specialist in San Francisco. She started constructing crosswords in 2020 and has been published in USA Today, Crucinova, and The New York Times app. Look out for more of her work in Universal and The Atlantic in 2022, and find crosswords deemed too spicy for the newspapers at her blog site. She spends most of her non-crossword time riding bikes, camping, and going to the library.

​

Kuney is a media researcher based in Queens, New York. She writes about words for Beyond Wordplay and Wordnik.com. She presented a puzzle for the 2020 puzzle episode of That Word Chat based on spoonerisms.

Vasquez runs the site QVXwordz. You may have seen her work in Newsday, USA Today, and The Atlantic — or, if you're a true puzzlehead, in Boswords, Fireball, or the AVCX. She is based in Brooklyn, New York.
 

Sign up below and we'll send you more details and the Zoom link before the show. Then join us at 4:30 p.m. EST (21:30 UTC) on Tuesday, December 7.