Quick Cryptic 393 by Hurley

Author   jackktPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
[Posted at 11:55:  As  noon approaches I’m not sure if today’s Quickie is covered. If there’s no news of it by 1:00 I shall post an emergency blog]

Posted at 13:18

9  minutes for this one. I’m not sure if there are many potential problems here so I’ll throw it open to the forum.

Definitions are underlined, deletions in curly brackets and indicators in square ones.

Across
1 He disparages thespian after adventure (oddly suppressed) (9)
DETRACTOR – {a}D{v}E{n}T{u}R{e} [oddly suppressed], ACTOR (thespian)
6 Drink is withdrawn: pressure to follow (3)
SIP – IS reversed (withdrawn), P (pressure)
8 Guy with large English spoon (5)
LADLE – LAD (guy), L (large), E (English)
9 Narrow-minded barb cut short by a Queen (7)
INSULAR – INSUL{t} (barb) [cut short], A, R (Queen). Care may be needed here not to think ER for Queen and ignore the A in the clue.
10 Legendary Swiss patriot thanks the French for revealing source (8)
TELLTALE – TELL (legendary Swiss patriot), TA (thanks), LE (the, French)
11 We’re told something other than nautical speed (4)
KNOT – Sounds like [we’re told] “not” (something other than)
13 Downloadable program, ultimately clever, attracts beginners (11)
APPRENTICES – APP (downloadable program), {cleve}R [ultimately], ENTICES (attracts)
17 Returning some tell oldster to relax (4)
LOLL – Hidden [some] and reversed [returning] inside {te}LL OL{dster}
18 Be like part of Empire’s emblem (8)
RESEMBLE – Hidden [part of] inside {empi}RE’S EMBLE{m}
21 Row about stray dog (7)
TERRIER – TIER (row) encloses [about] ERR (stray)
22 Criticise Bishop in the end (5)
BLAST – B (bishop), LAST (in the end)
23 Henry in the morning delivers meat (3)
HAM – H (Henry – that’s with reference to the SI unit of inductance), AM (in the morning)
24 Group meets hero unexpectedly (9)
THREESOME – Anagram [unexpectedly] of MEETS HERO

Down
1 Allowed to enter river to get wipe (6)
DELETE – LET (allowed) inside [to enter] DEE (river)
2 I had featured in short talk relating to sea level changes (5)
TIDAL – I’D (I had]) inside [featured in], TAL{k} [short]
3 Opening answer cheeky – you’re listening (8)
APERTURE – A (answer), PERT (cheeky), URE sounds like [listening] “you’re”
4 Practical method riled narrator, struggling (5,3,5)
TRIAL AND ERROR – Anagram [struggling] of RILED NARRATOR
5 Impetuous when embraced by Royal Highness (4)
RASH – AS (when) enclosed [embraced] by RH (Royal Highness). The abbreviation is more usually seen as HRH with the first ‘H’ standing for ‘His’ or ‘Her’, but the two-letter version is also valid.
6 Quiet nieces dancing left inside (7)
SILENCE – L (left) inside anagram [dancing] of NIECES
7 Rave, say, about island equalness? (6)
PARITY – PARTY (rave, say) encloses [about] I (island)
12 Similar to competent – pleasing (8)
LIKEABLE – LIKE (similar to), ABLE (competent)
14 Traveller not finishing medicine, unpleasant (7)
PILGRIM – PIL{l} (medicine} [not finishing], GRIM (unpleasant)
15 Malfunction disheartened girl with restless desire (6)
GLITCH – G{ir}L [disheartened], ITCH (restless desire)
16 Parking. manipulated steel tool (6)
PESTLE – P (parking), anagram [manipulated] of STEEL
19 Well done finding codeword! (5)
BRAVO – Two definitions, the second with reference to the NATO alphabet in which the answer represents the letter ‘B’ and is therefore a codeword.
20 Secure time for drink of beer (4)
PINT – PIN (secure), T (time)

8 comments on “Quick Cryptic 393 by Hurley”

  1. I was heading for a quick finish despite initially thinking 22a was an unparsed BLAME. Held up at the end with my last 3, PILGRIM, APPRENTICES and APERTURE.

    The smooth surface reading of 10a made it my favourite.

    1. Ingenious, and it’s a nice try, but I’m afraid it doesn’t really work. The corresponding definition of ‘settle’ would need to be ‘park’ (which I note you have written in your suggestion) but the clue has ‘parking’. The anagram of ‘steel’ is fine, but then you’re left with ‘T’ for ‘tool’ which is not a valid abbreviation.

      The answer has to be PESTLE with P standing for ‘parking’ (as on road-signs) followed by the anagram of ‘steel’ leaving ‘tool’ as the definition as in ‘pestle and mortar’.

      Thanks for contributing and please continue to do so. It’s nice to have a name or nickname at the end of anon messages, or you can create an ID in Live Journal and have your own user-pic.

  3. Thanks for stepping in again. The blog is appreciated. I got all except 3 down and 14 down. The phonetic alphabet seems to be appearing a lot as codes recently.
  4. Thanks for the blog Jackkt.

    At last a completed puzzle and all parsed too. LOI was 16d as it took me an age to figure out what was going on. Particularly enjoyed 10a and 13a.

  5. Pretty straightforward today. 25m, no real hold-ups. Didn’t understand the “Codeword” reference.
    1. It’s from the phonetic alphabet: alpha, bravo, charlie delta, echo, foxtrot, golf, hotel, india, juliet, kilo, lima, mike, november, oscar (my grandson’s name), papa, quebec, romeo, sierra, tango, uniform, victor, whisky, xray, yankee, zulu.

      regards, Di.

  6. A precisely clued enjoyable crossword (Izetti style);no obscurities and so I finished it fairly quickly in one sitting; and no stores today until I picked up the Evening Standard -headline “Store Wars”.
    David

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