Definitely a game of two halves. Lots of very straightforward clues, plus a few less obvious ones. I didn’t know the silk, and took ages to spot 3ac and 9dn. 7 and a bit minutes for me
| Across | |
| 1 | Strangely, bury precious stone (4) |
| RUBY – anagram (‘strangely’) of BURY | |
| 3 | Bishop gave instructions with an edge (8) |
| BORDERED – B + ORDERED. No idea why it took me so long to see this. | |
| 8 | Do you think of me as fit and friendly? (7) |
| AMIABLE – AM I ABLE? | |
| 10 | Push back piano and dance round (5) |
| REPEL – REEL round P | |
| 11 | Soldier looks at detectives (7,4) |
| PRIVATE EYES – self-explanatory | |
| 13 | Fool holds fixed investments? (6) |
| ASSETS – ASS (fool) with SET (fixed) inside | |
| 15 | One’s trying golden bargain (6) |
| ORDEAL – OR (golden colour in heraldry) + DEAL | |
| 17 | It is not representative of appropriate skill (8,3) |
| ABSTRACT ART – ABSTRACT (appropriate, verb) + ART (skill) | |
| 20 | Bear young learner into hollow (5) |
| CALVE – CAVE with L inside. | |
| 21 | American, singular in ripped silk (7) |
| TUSSORE – US + S inside TORE. A coarse type of silk from a moth of the same name | |
| 22 | Figure of speech in Homer apt to be misinterpreted (8) |
| METAPHOR – anagram (‘to be misrepresented’) of HOMER APT | |
| 23 | Support Remain (4) |
| STAY – Double definition. Though without checkers ‘REST’ would work. | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Come back to harvest fruit (8) |
| REAPPEAR – REAP PEAR | |
| 2 | Unable to see, daughter dropping one pancake (5) |
| BLINI – BLIND, minus D for daughter, + I | |
| 4 | Outside broadcast watched and observed (6) |
| OBEYED – OB (outside broadcast) + EYED | |
| 5 | Perpetrating these, you wouldn’t get clean away? (5,6) |
| DIRTY TRICKS – cryptic definition, I suppose. | |
| 6 | Smart reply in poster I distributed (7) |
| RIPOSTE – anagram (‘distributed’) of POSTER I | |
| 7 | I was first up in food store (4) |
| DELI -I LED backwards. One for the beginners to note, ‘food store’ nearly always clues as DELI | |
| 9 | Peach skins served up for rest (6,5) |
| BEAUTY SLEEP – BEAUTY (peach) + PEELS backwards | |
| 12 | Buttering up Cook to receive coffee (8) |
| FLATTERY – FRY with LATTE inside. Again, worth noting that ‘coffee’ is nearly always LATTE. | |
| 14 | Appearing embarrassed by colour of Holmes’s study (7) |
| SCARLET – double definition. The latter being from A Study In Scarlet by Arthur Conan Doyle. | |
| 16 | After golf, go off to Santa’s place? (6) |
| GROTTO – G (golf, NATO alphabet) + ROT (go off) + TO | |
| 18 | A base is in operation (5) |
| AFOOT – A + FOOT | |
| 19 | Unpleasant film starts off showing cold-blooded underworld murders (4) |
| SCUM – acronym. Could mean ‘film’ as layer, or indeed the 1979 flick starring Ray Winstone | |
13:16. Quite tricky! didn’t know the silk either.
DNF as NHO TUSSORE and couldn’t biff it. Quite hard in general, I thought.