Quick Cryptic 3077 by Hurley

Author   BletchleyRejectPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic

 

No bones about it – I found this on the harder side though maybe it was just me.

Not off to a good start as both 1a and 1b elicited the usual blank response with the rather oblique definition for 1a not helping. Nothing much came until I started to work up from the bottom of the grid and even then 11d and 22a in the SW corner were slow to come. The definition for 7d was another one which was hard to nail down and it was my LOI.

Difficult enough to feel satisfied after finally getting there. All finished in 16:33.

Thanks to Hurley

Definitions underlined in bold. Deletions and letters in wordplay not appearing in answer indicated by strikethrough.

Across
1 Militias react badly, hunting for goods? (13)
MATERIALISTIC – Anagram (‘badly’) of MILITIAS REACT

Definition on the cryptic side, tough anagram – not exactly a confidence builder at the start!
8 Abnormal feature of Montserrat I cited (7)
ERRATIC -Hidden (‘feature of’) MontsERRAT I Cited

MER at ERRATIC for ‘abnormal’. To me (and more importantly the dictionaries) ERRATIC means changing, inconsistent or unpredictable, which isn’t necessarily implied by ‘abnormal’. For what it’s worth though, abnormal is listed as a synonym for erratic (and vice versa) in the Chambers Thesaurus.
9 Mock afternoon meals, old-time ultimately (5)
TEASE – TEAS (‘afternoon meals’) old-timE (‘old-time ultimately’)
10 Evil one’s betrayer, we hear, one with something to show (12)
DEMONSTRATOR – DEMONS (‘Evil one’s’) then aural wordplay (‘we hear’) of TRAITOR (‘betrayer’)

The TRAITOR homophone here seems pretty uncontroversial, but then again, maybe not…
12 Strongly criticise extremely abject course taken (6)
ATTACK – AbjecT (‘extremely abject’) TACK (‘course taken’)
14 Referring to a child’s motive (6)
REASON – RE (‘Referring to’) A (‘a’) SON (‘child’)
17 In the end, sad article suggests couple lose hope (7)
DESPAIR – saD articlE suggestS (‘in the end, sad article suggests’) PAIR (‘couple’)
19 Proletariat held back, somewhat annoyed (5)
IRATE – Reverse hidden (‘held back, somewhat’) in ProlETARIate

The answer (and clue type) looks familiar. See last Saturday’s QC.
20 Law that’s no longer strictly accurate (5)
EXACT – A ‘Law that’s no longer’ would be an EX ACT
21 New red van in front of a gallery (7)
VERANDA – Anagram (‘New’) of RED VAN then (‘in front of’) A (‘a’)

A variant spelling of the (to me) more familiar VERANDAH. Of the standard references, Chambers is the only one to specifically mention the word ‘gallery’ in the definition.
22 Note race error (8)
MISPRINT – MI (‘Note’) SPRINT (‘race’)
23 Genuine regret comes after time (4)
TRUE – RUE (‘regret’) following (‘comes after’) T (‘time’)
Down
1 Not inclined to anger this person, European king (4)
MEEK – ME (‘this person’) E (‘European’) K (‘king’)

I had the def and wordplay the wrong way around on first reading the clue. Again, not the most obvious of definitions.
2 Sorry to ignore outsiders in shelter in downpour (7)
TORRENT – sORRy (‘Sorry to ignore outsiders’) contained in (‘in’) TENT (‘shelter’)
3 Proportion of allowance cut short (5)
RATIO – RATIOn (‘allowance cut short’)
4 Charge account, copper’s, initially exceeded (6)
ACCUSE – AC (‘account’) CUS (‘copper’s’) Exceeded (‘initially exceeded’)
5 Go-between’s re-entry, aim I’d worked on (12)
INTERMEDIARY – Anagram (‘worked on’) of RE ENTRY AIM ID
6 Extra item to some extent characteristic (5)
TRAIT – Hidden (‘to some extent’) in ‘ExTRA ITem‘
7 Following authorisations, beer event with nothing left at finish? (9,4)
CLEARANCE SALE – After (‘Following’) CLEARANCES (‘authorisations’) ALE (‘beer’)

As in security CLEARANCES.
11 Pleasant wish, ready-made? Not entirely, resort needed (8)
DAYDREAM – Partial anagram (‘Not entirely, resort needed’) of READY MADe

‘Resort’ as in “re-sort”. My thoughts weren’t so pleasant as I was wrestling with this not very difficult anagram.
13 Talk about headgear supplier (7)
CHATTER – C (‘about’) HATTER (‘headgear supplier’)

C (or can be CA) for “circa” / ‘about’.
15 Metal tool earns no praise at first in new arrangement (7)
SPANNER – Anagram (‘in new arrangement’) of EARNS and No and Praise (‘no praise at first’)

I was glad to see that “spanner” wasn’t a definition for the answer BRIDGE.

I took ‘Metal’ to be “made of metal”(Collins does mention a ‘metal’ and has “a steel hand tool…” as the def) rather than “used in working with metal”. Either works, though I imagine there could be non-metal spanners, or spanners could be used in working with materials other than metal. Over to you handymen / handywomen…
16 Determined foolish talk must change finally (6)
DRIVEN – DRIVEL (‘foolish talk’) with the final letter L changed to N (‘must change finally’)
18 They’re usually in cinemas, small things to munch (5)
SEATS – S (‘small’) EATS (‘things to munch’)

Good surface.

75 comments on “Quick Cryptic 3077 by Hurley”

  1. Glad it’s not just me that found this tough – didn’t see DAYDREAM until I had a few checkers in and realised what ‘resort’ meant. Biggest problem was my LOI CHATTER, though, which I couldn’t for the life of me work out – got the HAT, but without realised that C meant ‘about’ was struggling to get CTER as ‘supplier’. Also struggled with MISPRINT, which was silly as I seem to spend most of my working days in sprint review meetings, but that’s a moan for elsewhere…

  3. It wouldn’t have made any difference to me not finishing, but the definition to 1a should not have been allowed. Thank you to the blogger.

  4. 9:37 – I found this pretty tricky – quite a few biffs used. Very helpful having the blog to sort out ones like SPANNER. Is it just me or do words like DEMONSTRATOR look a bit US English with the OR at the end?

  5. Back into the SCC I go at 22:51, but at least I was just about able to finish this one.

    Thank you for the blog!

  6. Started slowly with foi Erratic, and I certainly needed a few crossers to get Materialistic, but Clearance Sale and Intermediary were write-ins, so the grid looked reasonably well populated after 10mins or so. However, I shot myself in the foot down near the bottom of the grid by trying to find/fit answers for the wrong clues a couple of times – very annoying when this happens.
    Crossed the line after 21mins, for a choice of window seats, thinking that was a bit slow, but it’s a rare old day when I can nod to Jackkt in the queue.
    Accuse was nice to parse, but CoD has to be Exact for the smile. Invariant

  7. I found this very hard, only managed four on the east side. I’ve not read all the comments above yet.

    Thank you for the blog BR

  8. A very long lunch today! Had to write out the long anagrams and didn’t get MATERIALISTIC until I had several checkers. Managed to parse as I went although SPANNER foxed me for quite some time. COD to the excellent DAYDREAM. I didn’t have a problem with SEATS as I thought the surface was very clever. LOI MISPRINT was a chewy one for me as I was expecting a triple definition. Felt tricky, but in retrospect not sure why. Many thanks both.

  9. Well we were a minute or two off the pace today at 13:56 though, having read the comments I don’t feel too bad about it now. Needed the checkers for 1a and we stared at POI MIS_R_N_ for what seemed like an age. SPANNER seemed obvious but we’d left that until last being unable to parse it. I find myself constantly getting caught out by ‘at first’, ‘initially’ etc. referring to more than one word. Thanks to BR and Hurley.

  10. DNF. Failed by 5 clues. Better than my effort on Monday.
    That Liz Hurley – an attractive woman but as a setter she can be quite harsh.

  11. Steady solve, taking around 30 mins. Spent a while trying to think of things peculiar to cinemas (and failing) before bunging in seats with a sigh.
    FOI True
    LOI Misprint
    COD Materialistic for a stinker of an anagram, which was satisfying to work out

    Thanks Hurley and BR

  13. 15:20. Pleased to finally see DAYDREAM. I thought of CATERER first before seeing CHATTER. Didn’t know VERANDA could be gallery. Enjoyed the long answers.

  14. I join the many here who found the SW demanding. The solve did not get off to a good start with 1a requiring most of the checkers. The same can be said of 7d. As for the SW I needed to crack DAYDREAM to speed things up and even then I was slow to see MISPRINTS. My LOI SEATS felt very unsatisfactory after cracking DAYDREAM. 11:06 Thanks BR

  15. This was quite tough, and I was happy to be done in 17:22 after a mighty tussle with MISPRINT (whyyy?), VERANDA (I don’t think of it as a gallery), and IRATE (British understatement?). Yes, some of the long ones needed many checkers but they came with reasonable effort. Some day I will internalize the fact that “about” can clue C or CA.

    Liked the elegant clues for TRUE and SEATS, COD to MATERIALISTIC.

    Thanks to Hurley and Bletch.

  16. Another infuriating DPS. Typing one fingered in my phone seems to be beyond me at the moment. Shame, because I really enjoyed the tussle. 09:43 but.

    Many thanks Hurley and Bletchers.

  17. 19:11 here. In common with many others, I couldn’t get the long clues on the edges until they had lots of checkers, so I was jumping all over the grid for a good while.

    Thanks to Hurley and BR.

  20. Crumbs! That was hard going. 40 minutes for me, but all parsed.

    FOsI: INTERMEDIARY then TRAIT
    LOsI: MISPRINT then EXACT

    As the half-hour point ticked by all but one (SEATS) of the eight clues in the SW corner remained blank. CHATTER and DRIVEN eventually came to my rescue and, one by one, I completed the grid.

    Many thanks to BR and HURLEY.

  22. Brilliant QC for this resident of the SCC.

    Lots of circling round the grid as letters went in, so helping with seeing answers . . . But a steady flow of success to keep me encouraged. Challenging yes, but (for me) satisfying and ultimately doable. Thank you Hurley and BR.

    Oh, and a masterclass in the need to “lift and separate” (etc). COD to EXACT (if measured by level of groan as the answer was seen) or DAYDREAM because I rapidly saw re-sort (an “aha” moment)

  23. Threw in the towel @ 25mins. Despite having all the checkers could not get Materialistic and Misprint – especially poor of me as I was certain of Mis and was looking for a race! Enjoyed battling my way through the other clues. Thanks BR and Hurley

  24. After a poor day on QC, I flew through 15 x 15. I got all bar two in 30 mins.

    30 minutes later I still had two to get!! Saw one but couldn’t parse, so put in something else. Couldn’t get the other!

    This is slowly driving me to despair. I can’t catch a break here.

  25. Very late in the day – but I took 19:32, so quite a lot longer than the main puzzle today. The SW held me up, with quite a few clues I found tough (but fair)
    Thanks setter and blogger, enjoyable puzzle

  26. Tricky. Not on the same wavelength. Eventually managed most, determined to plod on as a matter of principle rather than as a moment of enjoyment. Couldn’t work out why seats related to cinema.
    We usually have no axe to grind with Hurley – even when difficult. Today, too many clues, even when answered, left us wondering….even with the well written blog.
    Nevertheless, as always – enjoyed the comments.

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