Mate in two

White to play and mate in two moves:

Qh7!

Did you compose this?

Correct, SirDavid. And I did compose this, aided with software for error-checking.

OK. It's pretty good, but I would eliminate the pawn and Knight - as I understand it, it's desirable to use the fewest pieces possible for any composition.

Initially, the problem was without the pawn and the knight, but then I thought that it would be too easy to solve...

I'm sorry to say this, but it isn't too hard either way. It's clear that there will be no mate if you allow him to play Kh4, so you have to move the Queen to somewhere covering Kh4. It's also clear that if you allow Kf3, the Knight and pawn can't check so you have to mate with the Queen. The only square where the Queen could deliver mate in 1 is on d3, so you have to move the queen to attack both h4 and d3. The only square like that is h7. All that remains is to make sure the other defenses don't work.

Initially, I thought the Knight and pawn were just to eliminate other solutions, but since there don't appear to be any without them... Still, a good idea, but I prefer your other puzzles which are usually quite good and pretty difficult!

It only took you two minutes to solve, so definitely it was easy for you. I will try harder next time...

Don't worry, it's hard to make a difficult #2 with so few pieces. There's usually some logical way such as that to arrive at the solution.

I have an idea with this, though. If I can get it to work, would it be OK with you if I posted it on this thread?

Sure.

OK. Mate in two. It's still not too hard, but I think it adds a thing or two to the logic needed to solve it.

Qc5? Takes care of ...Kc3,...c3,...Ke4

Yep.