Quick Cryptic No 314 by Oran

Author   piquetPosted on Categories Quick Cryptic
I don’t know why our setter trades as ‘Oran’ – no doubt there is a story behind it, or perhaps he is Mr Gutan, who knows. Either way, he sets a good entry level puzzle with some clever d.defs and nothing too obscure or controversial. It took me 8 minutes.

Across
1 UNSAFE – Hidden in r(UNS A FE)stival, def. risky. A nice easy starter and makes 1d easier too.
4 TAIPEI – TAPE = recording, around I, then I for one, Chinese / Taiwanese city.
8 ABOVE ONES HEAD – Cryptic def. I’d have thought the phrase was more usually ‘over one’s head’ but that doesn’t fit.
10 DITCH – Double definition.
11 WENDING – W = head of wagon, ENDING = close, def. travelling, wending one’s way.
12 UNDER A CLOUD – Double def, one a cryptic pun.
16 ROSETTE – RO = OR (gold) returned; SETTE(R) = dog with no tail; def. ribbon. Well, a rosette is usually made of ribbon.
17 CAMEO – CAME = arrived, O = ring, def. piece of jewellery.
18 UNADULTERATED – (RUDE AUNT DEALT)*, anagrind ‘roughly’, def. with imperfections? No.
19 DASHED – Double definition; ‘I’m dashed if…’ and hopes are dashed = frustrated.
20 COOLER – Triple definition; one being jug = prison = cooler.

Down
1 UGANDA – U = university, then AND = also, inside GA = Georgia; def. state.
2 SHOOTING STARS – Cryptic double definition.
3 FRESH – Another double definition, saucy, and not salt (water).
5 ARSENAL – A, (LEARNS)*, anagrind ‘somehow’, def. ‘team’. Not just any old team, but The Gunners, Mrs K’s heroes.
6 PRECIOUS METAL – (CAESIUM PETROL)*, anagrind ‘mixed with’, def. platinum, perhaps. Do not try mixing caesium with petrol, or water, at home.
7 INDIGO – (W)IND(Y) = concealing extremities of WINDY, then I, GO = turn; def. blue!
9 NEWSAGENT – NEW’S = novel’s, A GENT = a fellow, def. shopkeeper.
13 ENTHUSE – (THESE UN)* anagrind ‘moves’, def. ‘are exciting’.
14 GROUND – Double defintion.
15 POWDER – POW = prisoner of war, Colditz inmate maybe, DER = German for ‘the’, def. explosive.
17 CARGO – CAR = automobile, GO = depart, def. load.

5 comments on “Quick Cryptic No 314 by Oran”

  1. Slowed down at several points–1ac, because I’m dim when it comes to hiddens, 4ac because I was unconsciously excluding Taiwan from China, 15d because I couldn’t remember what Colditz was, 13d because ‘enthuse’ as a transitive verb was new to me–but managed to get it all in in 6:40. I was pleased with myself for getting the anagram in 18ac without having to write the letters down.
    1. Well, it depends whose position you believe – the Taiwanese don’t think they are part of China.

      5D upset me and probably this had an impact on my performance for the rest of the puzzle – probably about 15 mins but I got interupted so didn’t time it properly.

  2. Also on the slow side having lost confidence yesterday.

    Spotting the hidden at 1ac earlier would have helped a lot but as things turned out, it was my last one in. It would have stopped me toying with RWANDA at 1dn and wondering if it might be spelt with a U and then wondering how RA might represent Georgia. Needed all the wordplay to come up with the Chinese city.

    Edited at 2015-05-22 08:37 am (UTC)

  3. A good, interesting QC. The word play in 11ac and 1d confused me for quite some time, and I needed the blog for the full parsing of 4 and 20ac. My thanks therefore to Pipkirby and Oran. Invariant
  4. When I finished this it felt like I’d made harder work of it than I should have done. I was a bit put off by ‘ones’ appearing in the clue and the answer in 8a and got a bit stuck on 5d, which should have been straightforward. Nearly made a very costly mistake with 11a (my LOI) but at the last minute realised that wending made more sense than winding.
    Also didn’t know that cameo was a type of jewelry but it couldn’t be anything else with the checkers in place

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