A straightforward puzzle with a wild preponderance of anagrams, and almost as many DDs. 6 minutes for me.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Film US president’s residence in Spain? (10) |
| CASABLANCA – ‘White House’ in Spanish | |
| 8 | Rotter, I forget his name! (2-3-2) |
| SO-AND-SO – double definition | |
| 9 | Row located in Salerno is exquisite (5) |
| NOISE – hidden word | |
| 10 | Alliance American figure rejected (4) |
| AXIS – A (American) + SIX backwards | |
| 11 | Fine dish turned over (8) |
| FINISHED – anagram (‘turned’) of FINE DISH | |
| 13 | Wild thing from dusk till dawn (5) |
| NIGHT – anagram (‘wild’) of THING | |
| 14 | Answer only divided by five (5) |
| SOLVE – SOLE ‘divided’ by V | |
| 16 | Unspoiled one, a US state (8) |
| VIRGINIA – VIRGIN + I + A | |
| 17 | Clip fasteners the wrong way round (4) |
| SNIP – PINS backwards | |
| 20 | Bloke securing lead on mutt — top dog? (5) |
| CHAMP – CHAP with M for mutt inserted | |
| 21 | Wild animal with lesions undergoing treatment (7) |
| LIONESS – anagram (‘undergoing treatment’) of LESIONS | |
| 22 | Story with mango about the art of cooking (10) |
| GASTRONOMY – anagram (‘about’) of STORY + MANGO | |
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Damage beginning to affect tourist area in Spain (5) |
| COSTA – COST (damage) + A for affect | |
| 2 | Yell about owning bathroom item (7,5) |
| SHAVING CREAM – HAVING (owning) inside SCREAM | |
| 3 | Furniture in English county (4) |
| BEDS – double definition, the second short for Bedfordshire | |
| 4 | A university teacher is much admired man (6) |
| ADONIS – A + DON + IS | |
| 5 | Ancients, when trained, most shrewd (8) |
| CANNIEST – anagram (‘when trained’) of ANCIENTS | |
| 6 | Artist calling home managed to save dime ultimately (12) |
| MICHELANGELO – anagram (‘managed’) of CALLING HOME + [ |
|
| 7 | Something sharp — is that on the record? (6) |
| NEEDLE – double definition | |
| 12 | Country close to Asia: I hope it flourishes (8) |
| ETHIOPIA – anagram (‘flourishes’) of [ |
|
| 13 | Beginner, only good? (6) |
| NOVICE – NO VICE | |
| 15 | Cut of meat, say, provided from the rear (6) |
| FILLET – TELL (say) + IF (provided) all backwards | |
| 18 | Fairly white pie (5) |
| PASTY – double definition | |
| 19 | Railway engine cracked (4) |
| LOCO – double definition. | |
11 minutes. Too many revisits to 10ac took me over my preferred 10 minute target before AXIS occurred to me.
I don’t think there are any conventions regarding the number of anagrams or cryptics and a balance need to be struck with other days when people find there are too many ‘knock-beginning/ends-off word’ clues or too many enclosures.
C, you forgot the I (‘one’) in VIRGINIA.
Whoops. Thanks
A good challenge, which felt stiffer than my eventual time of 8:45 would suggest. MICHELANGELO my LOI, but only because I put off attacking a 12 letter word ending in O for as long as possible – then when I finally came to it the answer popped out immediately from the checkers.
I’m never sure how to categorise wordplay like the second half of 7D, “is that on the record?” – I assumed it was a cryptic hint to the main definition “something sharp” not a second definition. But a nice clue either way.
Many thanks Curarist for the blog.
Yes LOI axis took lots of our time too. With the A and I crossers I was looking at removing some letters from AMERICAN that made a word for figure until Mrs RH came up with the answer at 19.54.
Liked shaving cream the most, thanks Mara and Curarist
Me too, with Axis, which pushed the solve to nearly 10 mins. For fillet, I am so used to assuming that “say” = e.g. so this was my only unparsed when I clicked the submit button. 1ac a witty clue.
I thought this was fairly friendly, maybe because of the number of anagrams.
Unfortunately a typo meant that I ended a sluggish crosswording week with a DPS.
Thanks to Curarist and Mara
Enjoyed this and experienced several PDMs, notably 1a which took far too long.
Like others AXIS gave me pause for thought, finally settling on that at 18:45.
Thanks to Mara and Curarist.