Thalia

I was counting whole sausages as "pieces". So it was the sum.

So 1 cut then. Is a whole sausage considered a piece or just the partial ones? If whole sausages count, I stand by my original pieces count. If not, I think rocdocmac has it.

Adding C

Thanks Ed! I made a chessboard in Paint and put mini chess pieces in each of the squares. Erased the pieces as I went through the clues.

Thought that wording was a bit repetitive. . .

Is Ed's interpretation of 8 correct?

Ed

That's quite possible, but from my interpretation, without any mention of the same row, the end refers to the whole side of the board. I will try it that way though!

Ok. Can you tell me which of the clues my answer violates?

Seems like there could be multiple answers from my interpretation of the clues.

Think I figured out my problem. What is the definition of adjacent? Sharing edges? Diagonal squares?

If the black queen is on the extreme east per clue 8 (N,S,W spaces adjacent), and alone in her column per clue 12, that leaves only the W space to put both the pawn and bishop mentioned in clue 8. Should it maybe read the queen is alone in her own row?

6 and 16 also seem to contradict as d5 is a white space according to the pictures I'm finding of notation.

For number 8, does that mean the black queen is on the opposite E-W extreme or just opposite half? Or can it potentially refer to N-S? Number 12 would seem to contradict that if it means the E-W extreme.

Assuming coming of age means 18...

It looks like you're taking the first letter and essentially rotating it through the different positions while the other letters remain in the same order. I noticed that all the possible permutations begin with two letters that were next to each other in the original sequence (or in the first and last spot). For example, I don't think you can get a sequence starting with AC. So this does not seem to hold up.