Quick Cryptic 767 by Mara

Author   william_j_sPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
Mine was a fairly uninspiring performance in solving what was a light and breezy puzzle. Nothing in particular held me up, just not in the groove, I suspect. I had to wait until blogging to parse 11ac, but all is very fair and well signposted. Combined with the two long anagrams and a lack of obscurities, I hope it is popular with other relative newbies.

I think 6dn is a semi&lit, in that the first part of the clue is required for the definition as well as being the wordplay. Happy to be corrected on this, though, along with any stray errors!

Definitions underlined.

Across
7 People, great nuisance (6)
MENACE – MEN (people) and ACE (great).
8 Endless dust on old, old book of the Bible (6)
EXODUS – DUSt without final letter (endless) on EX (old) and O (old).
9 Capital in Helsinki, evidently (4)
KIEV – hidden in helsinKI EVidently.
10 Something left outside tavern in France, say? (8)
REPUBLIC – RELIC (something left) surrounding (outside) PUB (tavern).
11 Tom gets to grips with problem conversation (4-4)
CHIT-CHAT – CAT (tom) surrounding (gets to grips with) HITCH (problem).
13 Knocked over giant, thus (4)
ERGO – reversal of (knocked over) OGRE (giant).
15 Threesome heading for Tokyo, Olympic city (4)
TRIO – first letter of (heading for) Tokyo with RIO (olympic city).
16 Help us to carry box for Greek philosopher (8)
SOCRATES – SOS (help us) surrounding (to carry) CRATE (box).
18 Rum, is it? A tipsy dessert! (8)
TIRAMISU – anagram of (tipsy) RUM IS IT A.
20 Thoughtful sort (4)
KIND – double definition.
21 Male entering hairdresser’s? That’s fishy! (6)
SALMON – M (male) inside (entering) SALON (hairdresser’s)
22 Sausage black — outrage! (6)
BANGER – B (black) and ANGER (outrage).
Down
1 Month in Portugal starts: that woman’s break (8)
DECIPHER – DEC (december, month), first letter (starts) of In Portugal, and HER (that woman).
2 Reformed Navy, a moralist Christian organisation (9,4)
SALVATION ARMY – anagram of (reformed) NAVY A MORALIST.
3 Shortage beginning to destroy planet (6)
DEARTH – first letter of (beginning to) Destroy and EARTH (planet).
4 Tyrant posted abroad (6)
DESPOT – anagram of (abroad) POSTED.
5 Causing obstruction with a car loading up, kerb obscured (6-7)
DOUBLE-PARKING – anagram of (obscured) LOADING UP KERB.
6 Peaks in fact undeniably Japanese icons — one of those? (4)
FUJI – first letters of (peaks in) Fact Undeniably Japanese Icons.
12 A party in trouble (3)
ADO – A and DO (party).
14 Teenager mixed drink (5,3)
GREEN TEA – anagram of (mixed) TEENAGER.
16 Lean out of empty shack in New York (6)
SKINNY – first and last letters of (empty) ShacK, with IN and NY (new york).
17 Fat head of cheating partner (6)
CHUBBY – first letter (head) of Cheating and HUBBY (partner).
19 I was in charge of Asian nation (4)
IRAN – I and RAN (was in charge of)

21 comments on “Quick Cryptic 767 by Mara”

  1. I thought this was quite tough for ‘oldies’ let alone ‘newbies’ @ 9.37 hereabouts – I was not in the groove either

    COD 1dn DECIPHER WOD TIRAMISU

    Aren’t 17dn HUBBY (and wifey) horrible words?

    45dn Mr. Putin’s pet red? (9,5)

    Edited at 2017-02-15 01:53 am (UTC)

  2. I guess this was on the tough side, but I definitely was on the dumb side: I quickly thought ‘box:crate’ at 16ac, and passed on; I missed FUJI first time around; I thought of CHIT-CHAT but couldn’t parse it at first; I made a total hash of 1d; I saw ‘endless dust’ and tried to think of a synonym for ‘dust’ to abbreviate; and so on. Moving on to the Concise and the 15×15, I got through both with good times, and an error in each. Feh. 9:07.
  3. 8 minutes with time lost by not biffing CHIT-CHAT which had occurred to me with only the first T checker in place, but I waited until I had a couple more before committing the thought to paper. On the other hand I saved myself time by NOT biffing ESTHER at 8ac on the strength of the first letter checker. DECIPHER was my LOI.
  4. Sneaked under 40 minutes today, with about 15 of those spent on 7a menace and 1d decipher.

    Lots of good clues. Quite tough but satisfying solve.

    My COD to green tea.

  5. But cwifey doesn’t work. And it would be the end to call her fat.

    Pretty good puzzle.

    I’m a relative newbie and enjoyed it.

  6. 20 mins, then 10 more on 7a (MENACE), even with all checkers dozens of words fit. I thought it was just a double def, having been unable to think of MEN for people.

    COD DECIPHER.

  7. I can go one better than Vinyl – the 15×15 actually took me less time than the so-called Quickie (note to crossword editor: I’m thinking of complaining under the Trades Description Act).
    It took me sometime over 20 minutes after which panic started to kick in. I became horribly befuddled over 7a & 1d, and 22a & 17d. Definitely one I want to expunge from my memory
    2. I can only say that we must be wired very differently ! Today’s 15×15 took ages. Invariant
  8. I’m surprised people found this difficult. I don’t think there was anything too tricky. Although, the one’s I think are hard, people here find easy, so swings and roundabouts and all that. LOI was BANGER, and slightly held up by spelling TIRAMISU wrong! Gribb.
  10. Mara has become one of the more challenging QC setters. I knew when I saw his name I’d need to give this my full attention. I was greatly helped by getting the two long down clues ( 2d and 5d) quite quickly. I thought 2d in particular was straightforward. After that I ploughed on with my last two being 16d (where I wanted to put Slinky at first) and 21a. My LOI was 21a -quite easy once you see it but I needed to get Skinny first. 23 minutes. COD -11a. David
  11. Longer than average for me, but difficult to see why. Seems to be a number of clues with unusual structures so I kept heading off in the wrong direction. Maybe it was just me. I agree re 6dn, a partial &lit.
    PlayupPompey
  12. A welcome change after yesterday’s struggle. An extra 5 mins on the 1d / 7ac combination pushed me into an average 35 mins, but otherwise this seemed quite reasonable. My favourite was 10ac, Republic, just ahead of chit-chat. Invariant
  13. Hello all, first time posting here.

    I think I agree that the ‘one of those’ saves 6d from being an &lit – COD 2d is one of my favourite types, where the clue plays straight, but the ‘long way around’ also shades the answer (either Reformed or Moralist, depending on your views on the Sallys) – 1a from last month was a recent highlight.

    FOI 15a, LOI 16d (raising my eyebrow at a rare word from the clue in the answer).

  14. Couldn’t get any rhythm going with this one. Felt a bit out of sorts as a result. Seems others felt somewhat similar. All put away within 45 minutes except for 1d and 7a which took another 30 minutes or so, although they shouldn’t have taken any time at all – me just being slow-witted today I thought. However, seems others also had to struggle a bit with these. Solving 2d quite early wasn’t the help I hoped for, ditto 5d. Saw 11a quite quickly but resisted until there was no other solution and then saw the parsing. FOI 9a LOI 7a COD 16a. I seem to remember several of these words from earlier QCs – 7a 13a 15a 18a 19d 3d 14d. Pleased to have resolved this one in the end!
  15. I usually struggle with Mara’s puzzles but I found this on the easier end of his scale – therefore about average overall, as indicated by my solving time of 17 mins. The parsing of 11a had me baffled until post solve but ended up being my COD. LOI 1d.
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