A neat and satisfying puzzle from Mara, perhaps slightly harder than usual, I think, as it took me about 1 1/2 minutes over average. Do tell us how you got on. Plenty of fairly straightforward clues to get us going and nothing too difficult, but a couple of sneaky bits may hold some people up. I liked the way the enumeration in the answer didn’t match the backward word pieces in 21a, and it was good to make us think with a definition of just ‘Wild animals’ in 23a, for example. A couple of little gems along the way – 11a my favourite, but I liked 8d too. Thanks Mara for the nicely judged challenge – that was fun!
Definitions underlined in italics, (ABC)* indicating anagram of ABC, {} deletions and [] other indicators.
| Across | |
| 1 | Big and beautiful! (8) |
| HANDSOME – Double definition. Of course you don’t have to be big to be beautiful, but if you are both you could be doubly this. Alas, I am neither. | |
| 5 | Religious education in the morning papers (4) |
| REAM – RE (Religious Education) + AM (in the morning) to get 500 sheets of paper (or 20 quires). | |
| 9 | Great lover, antipodean native hugging me (5) |
| ROMEO – ROO (antipodean native) including [hugging] ME to get the tragic star-crossed lover. The thought of being hugged by a kangaroo is a bit scary, I think. | |
| 10 | Increasing success in sailors’ drink (7) |
| GROWING – WIN (success) [in] GROG (sailors’ drink). Hmm. A drink I’ve never tried. But here‘s how you make it. Yo ho ho! | |
| 11 | Fool, a silly sausage for starters (3) |
| ASS – A S{illy} S{ausage} [for starters]. I liked this one. Silly sausage also meaning fool! | |
| 12 | Passing trains, ten diverted (9) |
| TRANSIENT – (trains, ten)* [diverted]. Moving on… | |
| 13 | Somewhat shabby, poor design seen from the back is sagging (6) |
| DROOPY – …we get a hidden word backwards [from the back] in {shabb}Y, POOR D{esign}. Hello all you happy people! | |
| 15 | Rag: it’s arranged for free (6) |
| GRATIS – (Rag: It’s)* [arranged]. Yes. I offer you this answer free, gratis and for nothing. | |
| 17 | One country or another welcoming almost everyone (9) |
| AUSTRALIA – AUSTRIA (another country) including [welcoming] AL{l} (almost everyone) i.e. losing the last letter. A bit of a chestnut, I think. Or should that be Castanosprenum Australe? | |
| 19 | Evil is returning with nefarious leader (3) |
| SIN – SI (is backwards) [returning] + first letter of N{efarious} [leader]. Naughty. | |
| 20 | Insulin, say, moorhen might produce (7) |
| HORMONE – (moorhen)* [might produce]. Say moorhen… do you pronounce the first syllable to rhyme with more or doer? We had this the other day. I’m the latter, which shows I wasn’t brought up where I live now. | |
| 21 | Not entirely laid back, bees uniquely busy (2,3) |
| IN USE – Another backwards [laid back] hidden answer [Not entirely] – {be}ES UNI{quely}. A neat misdirection here (see the intro). | |
| 22 | Christmas prize giver, heartless (4) |
| NOEL – The prize giver NO{b}EL loses the middle letter [heartless]. Ho ho ho! | |
| 23 | Wild animals: sharks, we hear? (8) |
| CHEETAHS – My last one in. Sounds like [we hear] cheaters (sharks). I needed all the checkers to find the wild animals. | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Very able recruits initially residing in tough US university (7) |
| HARVARD – V{ery} A{ble} R{ecruits} [initially] inside [residing in] HARD (tough) to get one of the Ivy league colleges. | |
| 2 | Same novel under new titles (5) |
| NAMES – (Same)* [novel] under N (new). Selling the same book with multiple titles? Sounds a bit nefarious to me. Or even all of 19a. | |
| 3 | Player heading for success prospers: not bad! (12) |
| SPORTSPERSON – [heading for] S{uccess} + (prospers: not)* [bad]. Prospers? What is the average wage of a Premiership football player? Over £50,000 a week, according to this! Bad or not bad? Discuss. | |
| 4 | Papa’s partner embracing good, hot rock (5) |
| MAGMA – MAMA (Papa’s partner) with G (good) in the middle [embracing]. What you find beneath the earth’s crust that becomes lava when it erupts from a volcano. | |
| 6 | Obvious I had to enter competition (7) |
| EVIDENT – Another inclusion clue. EVENT is the competition; Insert I’D. You saw this straight away, didn’t you? | |
| 7 | Strength — could be (5) |
| MIGHT – Double Definition, I suggest. | |
| 8 | Blue square (12) |
| CONSERVATIVE – And another double definition, first cryptic. So concise the clue is shorter than the answer! And neatly implying a characteristic of such a party member. Whoops! Say no more John. We don’t discuss politics here! | |
| 14 | Watch ever so unreliable, black inside (7) |
| OBSERVE – See how this works… (EVER SO)* [unreliable] including B (black) [inside]. | |
| 16 | Boy catches some poetry (7) |
| SONNETS – SON (Boy) + NETS (catches). If you didn’t know already, here is a description of the poetic form. | |
| 17 | Very pale, he’s an eccentric (5) |
| ASHEN – (he’s an)* eccentric. And possibly not very well. | |
| 18 | Sucker will disbelieve the basic truth, last of all (5) |
| LEECH – Last letters of [last of all] of {wil}L {disbeliev}E {th}E {basi}C {trut}H. I had some blood taken at the hospital this week, but they don’t use leeches any more. | |
| 19 | Type of diving ducks finally seen on island (5) |
| SCUBA – {duck}S [finally] + CUBA (island). No. Not diving ducks, just diving. If you thought that, close, but no cigar. | |
Phew! All done. And so to bed, and, as 9a said…
“Good night, good night! parting is such sweet sorrow,
That I shall say good night till it be morrow.”
Oh. I do believe it is morrow already.
Edited at 2018-01-19 06:54 am (UTC)
Edited at 2018-01-19 05:49 am (UTC)
Seemed a shade easier than average, although several where biffed after checkers.
LOI 23a CHEETAHS
I did not know 17a was a chestnut so was pleased to work it out.
I was convinced that 3D would be a footballer ‘heading for success’ as I hadn’t bothered to count the number of letters in the anagrist so didn’t see that I was one short.
COD 8d, esp with bloggers comment that the answer is longer than the clue.
Also. I have not broken 20 mins for ages.
As a side note, does anybody else see strange coincidences with the cryptics? Yesterday, my partner (a definite non-cryptic type) and I had a conversation where I posited a clue along the lines of “possible strength”. Behold, today, 7d. This has happened several times now, with the word usually turning up in next day’s puzzle. Strange…
8d, 18d and 23a.
LOI was leech – had to come here to see why. Frustration as I had looked at the other end of each word – wdtbt didn’t seem to be a word. Not sure why having thought the answer would use L – last of all – I looked at the wrong end of the word.
Took an age on 8d as withouth cheetah I was looking for a word to fit _o_s_r_ation. Loud groan for that and a sigh of relief when that make 23a leap out.
End of a good week for me. Thanks for the blogs, see you Monday!
Comeonuirons
Could not fathom 8d. 21a and 23a similar. And thought 19d was Skua (diving ducks?) plus N. Oh dear!
I put the puzzle down and went away. I actually thought of Conservative whilst wandering round the house. That unlocked the others with Scuba LOI.
COD to 8d. A good half hour in the end. David
PS Congrats to the first timer who completed this puzzle.
I stopped the clock at 8 minutes and I don’t think I’ve ever gone faster than that. COD 23a
Thanks for the blog.
Enjoyable crossword. the 2 anagrams sportsperson and transient held me up slightly.
Liked sonnets, conservative and COD cheetahs.