A puzzle of average difficulty from Flamande today, with his usual credible surfaces. I would guess that 15D might be the only uncommon word for solvers, assuming that everyone has at least a passing familiarity with films describing a dystopian future in Australia. I think 6D gets my COD vote, for the nice anagram and apposite anagram indicator, though I was also quite taken by the image of the seasick holy person in 21A.
The puzzle can be found here if the usual channels are unavailable: http://feeds.thetimes.co.uk/puzzles/crossword/20170828/25770/
Definitions are underlined, {} = omission
| Across | |
| 1 | Release cadet, excited at start of holiday (6) |
| DETACH – anagram of (excited) CADET, + H{oliday} (start of holiday, i.e. the first letter of the word “holiday”) | |
| 4 | Be a tell-tale in class (6) |
| INFORM – IN + FORM (class) | |
| 8 | After a week, child in custody becomes uncooperative (7) |
| AWKWARD – A + WK (week) + WARD (child in custody) | |
| 10 | Path leads to the Roman amphitheatre in Livorno (5) |
| TRAIL – initial letters of (leads to) The Roman Amphitheatre In Livorno. I have no idea if there actually is an amphitheatre in Livorno, but of course there doesn’t need to be for the clue to work and it helps the surface hang together nicely. | |
| 11 | Millions in America finding something negative (5) |
| MINUS – M (Millions) + IN + US (America) | |
| 12 | Hoisted a very short distance within a day (7) |
| WINCHED – INCH (a very short distance) within WED (a day, i.e. Wednesday) | |
| 13 | First of tea cakes for newly-formed working group (4,5) |
| TASK FORCE – anagram of (newly-formed) T{ea} (First of tea, i.e. the first letter of the word “tea”) CAKES FOR. All the usual sources give teacake as one word – this would obviously scupper the wordplay but I frankly wouldn’t have noticed if I hadn’t been blogging. | |
| 17 | Garment superior to everything else? (7) |
| OVERALL – if something is superior to everything else then it is OVER ALL | |
| 19 | One nibbles morsel with some hesitation (5) |
| BITER – BIT (morsel) + ER (some hesitation) | |
| 20 | Portion of pastry dish, plus crepe without filling (5) |
| PIECE – PIE (pastry dish) + C{rep}E (crepe without filling, i.e. the word “crepe” without its inner letters) | |
| 21 | Saint sick in a boat? (7) |
| SAILING – S (Saint) + AILING (sick). We perhaps more commonly see St as an abbreviation for saint but S is valid too. | |
| 22 | Film for adults only, once, mother sneaking daughter in at the front (3,3) |
| MAD MAX – MAMA (mother) around (sneaking … in) D (daughter), at the front of X (for adults only, once – a reference to the old X-rated certificate for films). Coincidentally, Mad Max was initially rated X by the British Board of Film Classification. | |
| 23 | Military commander to reveal, we hear, weapon (6) |
| SHOGUN – homophone (we hear) of SHOW (to reveal), + GUN (weapon) | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Armed criminal clutching end of knife? Gosh! (4,2) |
| DEAR ME – anagram of (criminal) ARMED, around (clutching) {knif}E (end of knife, i.e. the last letter of the word “knife”) | |
| 2 | Preparing to walk with dog, or going in the van (6,3,4) |
| TAKING THE LEAD – literal interpretation, in that you might well be TAKING THE LEAD if you were preparing to take your dog for a walk. The “van” in the definition means the front. | |
| 3 | Charles and little sister in the frame? (7) |
| CHASSIS – CHAS (Charles) + SIS (little sister, i.e. an abbreviation for the word “sister”) | |
| 5 | Unacceptable, whichever way you look at it (3,2) |
| NOT ON – no wordplay other than an indication that the answer is a palindrome (“whichever way you look at it”), but once you have the checking letters then the correct vowel should suggest itself | |
| 6 | Another song is composed at minimum expense? (2,1,10) |
| ON A SHOESTRING – anagram of (composed) ANOTHER SONG IS | |
| 7 | Illness man contracted, along with woman (6) |
| MALADY – MA{n} (man contracted, i.e. the word “man” without its last letter) + LADY (woman) | |
| 9 | Depressed before autumn’s rainstorms? (9) |
| DOWNFALLS – DOWN (Depressed) + FALLS (autumn’s) | |
| 14 | Polish bishop out of work? Nonsense (7) |
| RUBBISH – RUB (Polish) + BISH{op} (bishop out of work, i.e. the word “bishop” without the “op” (work)) | |
| 15 | Weapon made by two Englishmen down under (3-3) |
| POM-POM – if a POM is one Englishman down under, then POM POM would be two. Chambers: “An automatic quick-firing gun, esp a multi-barrelled anti-aircraft gun”, with the name supposedly an imitation of its sound. Probably the most unusual word in the puzzle, though the wordplay is helpful. I think I knew this from Warlord or The Victor or some similar comic from my youth. | |
| 16 | Alternatively, I must go to northern US state (6) |
| OREGON – OR (Alternatively) + EGO (I) + N (northern). Oregon does happen to be in the north(-west) of the US, but the clue would still work (with a nicely deceptive surface) even if it wasn’t. | |
| 18 | Sports venue in Delaware, namely (5) |
| ARENA – hidden in (in) DelawARE NAmely | |
I you do a Google image search on ‘pom-pom’, you will see that things have changed somewhat since the end of the war.
Thanks for the blog as I didn’t twig lots of things:
van for lead
pom pom for weapon
14d I had rubb but couldn’t see how ish = out of work.
COD 1d Dear Me.
Eventually completed in 13 minutes, COD 1d or 16d.
I’d have got to WINCHED faster if I hadn’t been brought up on metric. Someone used 50′ to indicate 50 feet in something I was reading earlier and it took me ages to work out what they were talking about…
Held up by 15d 22a and LOI 21a. Spent about another 14 minutes on those. Did not fully parse Mad Max but remembered Pom Pom as a gun from some boyhood source.
COD to Dear Me.
And my wife had Pom Pom in the T2 crossword -like every one else it seems. David
WOD 15dn POM-POM
LOI 21ac SAILING
Time 9.07 – nothing to write home about!