Lovely, on the tricky side.
This is Kybos’s fourth puzzle since first appearing last September, clocking up 120, 115, and 105 on the Quitch, in that order.
This should halt the downward trend, with some cunning definitions and tricks more often seen in the 15×15 than the QC. But we also had a good number of more gettable openers and anagrams that should help to open up the grid.
So nicely-pitched difficulty, I’d say, that took me 7:45 (compared to a notch under 6 yesterday and a notch over 9 on Tuesday). I thought it was a cracker, with lots of wit and satisfying PDMs – many thanks to Kybos!
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | Giving seat, I moved to the end counter? (10) |
| CHARITABLE – CHAIR (seat) with I moved to the end, TABLE (counter) | |
| 8 | On reflection, treasure, I’d rather cuddles later (7) |
| TARDIER – a hidden (“cuddles”) reversal (“on reflection”) within treasuRE ID RATher. | |
| 9 | Legitimate to return age 50, having left before (5) |
| LEGAL – “return”/reverse AGE L (fifty in Roman numerals), with L(eft) before | |
| 10 | Metal coating for incinerator working (4) |
| IRON – IR (“coating” for I |
|
| 11 | Healthy concealing flings? Most dodgy (8) |
| FISHIEST – FIT (healthy) concealing/covering SHIES (to SHY = to fling) | |
| 13 | Shot took out sheltering king (6) |
| DARTED – DATED (took out) sheltering R (Rex = king). To SHOOT = to speed/dash/dart/etc; and TAKING OUT is a dated term for what the kids are calling COURTING. | |
| 14 | Suddenly drop breathing apparatus during exercise (6) |
| PLUNGE – LUNG (breathing apparatus) during PE (exercise) | |
| 17 | Despite expectations, rate fall is staggering (5,3) |
| AFTER ALL – anagram ( is staggering) of RATE FALL | |
| 19 | Finish second work — about time! (4) |
| STOP – S(econd) OP (opus = work) about T(ime) | |
| 21 | All voices express disapproval over it (5) |
| TUTTI – TUT (express disapproval), “over”/reverse IT | |
| 22 | Horse feeding device began so peculiarly (7) |
| NOSEBAG – anagram (peculiarly) of BEGAN SO | |
| 23 | Behaves contrarily, surrounded by mean people and no-hopers (4,6) |
| LOST CAUSES – ACTS (behaves) “contrarily” = reversed, surrounded by LOUSES (mean people) | |
| Down | |
|---|---|
| 2 | Refuge close to church and leafy glade (7) |
| HARBOUR – H (“close”/end to churcH) and ARBOUR (leafy glade). ARBOUR. Chambers says the origin is Anglo-French herber, from Latin herba grass, with the meaning having changed through confusion with Latin arbor tree. | |
| 3 | Make a mess of text checking someone’s home? (4) |
| RUIN – or, in text-speak, R U IN? (are you in?) | |
| 4 | Vegetable providing clue for PI (6) |
| TURNIP – the sort of reverse cryptic that crops up a bit more in the 15×15 than the QC: if you “TURN” IP you get PI. For the clever surface, PI is Private Investigator. | |
| 5 | Escape damage from crossbow? (8) |
| BOLTHOLE – an ESCAPE as in the 2d sense of a refuge or safe harbour; and then a cryptic hint with a (very much situationally dependent) bit of whimsy. | |
| 6 | Dog avoiding black bird (5) |
| EAGLE – BEAGLE (dog) avoiding the B(lack). B for Black as in HB (hard black) on pencils. | |
| 7 | The cop’s leg fidgets — it could stop trousers falling off? (7,3) |
| CLOTHES PEG – anagram (fidgets) of THE COPS LEG. I like the image of a jittery cop sporting the sartorial innovation of a clothes peg for a belt. | |
| 8 | Tip: try hard to change, providing limited coverage (5-5) |
| THIRD-PARTY – anagram (to change) of TIP TRY HARD. As in insurance. I needed to write the anagrist out for this, my penultimate one in, which I needed for the D for DARTED at 13ac. | |
| 12 | Armies scattered, dividing north and south — close call (4,4) |
| NEAR MISS – anagram (scattered) of ARMIES divides N and S | |
| 15 | Impotent celebrity (7) |
| NOTABLE – NOTABLE as noun: a person worthy of note; and NOT ABLE = impotent. | |
| 16 | Medical centre initially called lab investigating new index cases (6) |
| CLINIC – “initial” letters of the rest of the clue. | |
| 18 | Child, advanced learner, missing nothing (5) |
| TOTAL – TOT (child) A (Advanced: as in A-Level) L(earner) | |
| 20 | Falsely sue a son of Isaac (4) |
| ESAU – anagram (falsely) of SUE A | |
Tricky in places. Our timer stopped in a faster than average 10:49 though it took us several seconds afterwards to parse the biffed LOI LOST CAUSES. Enjoyed this. Thank you, Roly and Kybos.
10:15. Quite hard and I wondered if I would finish at one point. I liked TURNIP the best.
I’m impressed by some of the timings above, as I found this pretty challenging, though I did make it to the end. I just couldn’t work out some of the parsings, so rolytoly’s blog has been most helpful.
LOI: RUIN
PDM: RUIN – made me smile!
COD: RUIN
30 mins. Darted took a while, until I realised that there are more pleasant ways of taking somone out than the one I was fixating on. I enjoyed this too
FOI Iron
LOI Darted
COD Bolthole
Thanks Kybos and Roly
Haha I had the same problem with “taking out”.
Just over 10 mins so quite a bit quicker than average for me today. Didn’t have any hold ups and thought it was very straight-forward.
Thanks Roly and Kybos
No time but will have been over 30 minutes. Struggled throughout and my limited ability was ruthlessly exposed. Spent over 10 mins on last two, BOLTHOLE and FISHIEST.
Another dismal day. Miles behind my comparators and no sign of progress.
Blimey! Very hard to get started. Then quite fast through the mid-phase. And finally almost impossible to finish.
First 17 clues in 16 minutes (good for me).
Last 7 clues took 35 minutes (agonising).
My last seven were TARDIER, CHARITABLE, RUIN, TURNIP, FISHIEST, HARBOUR and DARTED (in that order).
Total time = 51 minutes, which is getting on for twice my average time.
Thanks to Roly and Kybos.
Very hard and not much fun. Though I’m hoping to learn from Rolytoly’s explanations. An arbour is a man made construction in a garden not a leafy glade.
Holy mackerel that was hard. I barely stayed IN the Club (29:40), by the time I got here all the pastry was gone. It was such hard going that I was astonished when I found I had parsed it all and actually have too many favorite clues to think of choosing just one. BOLTHOLE, CLOTHES PEG, TURNIP for three. The NW was my real downfall, I started with RUIN (haha) but my last three were CHARITABLE, FISHIEST, TURNIP.
Thanks Kybos (abnormis or abstrusus?) and roly.