ACL Grid: 9 mins; Meta: 10 mins 
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Greetings from Down Under! It’s Ben here with the June release from Ariadne’s Crossword Library. And the guest constructors just keep coming! This month we have Lee Taylor, with an 18×17 puzzle entitled “The Art of Writing”, and meta answer a novel.
Given the title, the first long across entry leapt out at me: even though it was not clued as such, THE LAST SUPPER is the title of a well-known painting. And the other long entries proved similar:
- 20A. {Event commemorated by Holy Communion} THELASTSUPPER
- 38A. {Billiard hall} POOLPARLOR
- 51A. {1995 cult classic TV horror drama} AMERICANGOTHIC
- 67A. {Mostly nocturnal, insect-eating birds} NIGHTHAWKS
- 86A. {Warm Atlantic ocean current} THEGULFSTREAM
When I thought of the painter of “The Last Supper”, Leonardo da Vinci, I immediately remembered seeing “Leonardo” in another clue. And that proved to be true for the other paintings as well: one part of each painter’s name appears in other clues:
- “The Last Supper” by Leonardo da Vinci >21D {Leonardo’s costar in “The Great Gatsby”} TOBEY
- “Pool Parlor” by Jacob Lawrence > 82D. {Resting place for D. H. Lawrence“} TAOS
- “American Gothic” by Grant Wood > 43A. {Wood used for baseball bats} ASH
- “Night Hawks” by Edward Hopper > 85D. {Sid: “___ Story” :: Hopper : “A Bug’s Life” } TOY
- “The Gulf Stream” by Winslow Homer > 52D. {Homer hitting Babe} RUTH
In grid order, these entries spell TARTT. A quick google search of “Tartt novel” reveals Donna Tartt wrote three:
- The Secret History
- The Little Friend
- The Goldfinch
Unfortunately, I’ve read none of these. But Wikipedia tells me that “The Goldfinch” is about a young boy named Theo Decker who survives a terrorist bombing at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and inadvertently smuggles a famous painting out of the rubble. Which painting? Carel Fabritius’s THE GOLDFINCH. So presumably, that’s the meta answer.
Thanks to Lee for a fun meta, and, as always, thanks to Emma for editing this series!