Hello, and welcome to Christmas Eve Eve. I hope you all have a lovely festive season and I’ll see you again on the other side.
EDIT: following comments, I can reassure you that today’s puzzle was clearly on the tough side for a Quick Cryptic. I must have been in the zone as nothing held me up unduly and I found plenty to like, my favourite clue being 16d. Thanks Pedro!
Definitions are underlined in the clues below. In the explanations, most quoted indicators are in italics, specified [deletions] are in square brackets, and I’ve capitalised and emboldened letters which appear in the ANSWER. For clarity, I omit most link words and some juxtaposition indicators.
| Across | |
| 7a | French food that is to the rear of British (4) |
| BRIE — IE (that is) after (to the rear of) BR. (British) | |
| 8a | Popular group, with leader away, failing to perform (8) |
| INACTION — IN (popular) + fACTION (group) without the first letter (with leader away) | |
| 9a | Oppose wild jumping Jack abandons (6) |
| IMPUGN — An anagram of (wild) [j]UMPING which J (jack) leaves (abandons) | |
| 10a | Former lover abandoned bottle, almost free (6) |
| EXEMPT — EX (former lover) + EMPTy (abandoned bottle) stopping short of its last letter (almost) | |
| 11a | Group of hunters satisfied bagging tail of grouse (4) |
| MEET — MET (satisfied) taking in (bagging) the last letter of (tail of) grousE | |
| 12a | Road marker from motorway with large English letters (8) |
| MILEPOST — MI (M1, motorway) + L (large) + E (English) + POST (letters) | |
| 15a | Bored concealing power provided by working munitions (8) |
| WEAPONRY — WEARY (bored) around (concealing) P (power) and ON (working) | |
| 17a | Web program beginning to harm two things (4) |
| BOTH — BOT (web program) + the first letter of (beginning to) Harm | |
| 18a | Church expert accepting new risk (6) |
| CHANCE — CH. (church) + ACE (expert) taking in (accepting) N (new) | |
| 21a | Liberal American backed attempt with passion (6) |
| SULTRY — L (Liberal) and US (American) reversed (backed) + TRY (attempt) | |
| 22a | Ran round Sidney, off-balance (8) |
| LOPSIDED — LOPED (ran) round SID (Sidney) | |
| 23a | Right to deploy plan (4) |
| RUSE — R (right) + USE (to deploy) | |
| Down | |
| 1d | Top politician going to European film debut (8) |
| PREMIERE — PREMIER (top politician) + E (European) | |
| 2d | Lustre going off in sequel (6) |
| RESULT — LUSTRE anagrammed (going off) | |
| 3d | Oral statement of offender on Monday is spicy stuff (8) |
| CINNAMON — CINNA here is a soundalike of (oral statement of) SINNER (offender) on MON (Monday) | |
| 4d | Create market that’s failing regularly? (4) |
| MAKE — MArKEt having regular letters deleted (that’s failing regularly?) | |
| 5d | Looks up to take in introduction of theatrical Hollywood star (6) |
| STREEP — PEERS (looks) reversed (up) to take in the first letter (introduction) of Theatrical | |
| 6d | Concession securing a TV series? (4) |
| SOAP — SOP (concession) around (securing) A | |
| 13d | Bet political advisor will keep source of scandal in reserve (3,5) |
| LAY ASIDE — LAY (bet) + AIDE (political advisor) will contain (keep) the initial letter (source) of Scandal | |
| 14d | Sort of comic artist is funny (8) |
| SATIRIST — ARTIST IS anagrammed (funny) | |
| 16d | Wordplay is hard to beat? (6) |
| PUNISH — PUN (wordplay) + IS + H (hard) | |
| 17d | Negative comment involving the French debut for Ravel — this piece? (6) |
| BOLERO — BOO (negative comment) containing (involving) LE (the, French) and the first letter of (debut for) Ravel | |
| 19d | Ring Houses of Parliament initially about nothing (4) |
| HOOP — First letters of (… initially) Houses Of Parliament around (about) O (nothing) | |
| 20d | Limits or borders of European domains (4) |
| ENDS — Outer letters of (borders of) EuropeaN DomainS | |
As I solved, I felt like I was progressing slowly, but only after opening quickly, putting in brie, premiere, impugn, and meet in a ten-second flurry. Things came to an abrupt halt after that! Well, I did see cinnamon fairly quickly, but after that I was hopping around the grid looking for easy clues. I finished up with satirist – oh, it’s an anagram! – and then ruse.
Time: 9:34
21 minutes.
Unenjoyable.
Not one for the novice. I revelled in Bolero. That was my only solve today.
I am encouraged that I did solve two clues in the Sunday Times cryptic.
10:50
Deffo on the trickier side, though looking back, there wasn’t anything too difficult. I could only pencil in RESULT as I too was unsure that it was synonymous with sequel. IMPUGN is an excellent word though. LOI was BOTH which I thought was clever.
Thanks Pedro and Kitty
Finished in just under 10 mins.
Bunged in RESULT as the only possible anagram of lustre with the available checkers, but for the life of me I can’t see how sequel=result.🤔
Terrible puzzle for a QC and much to hold up novices like me. Seems recently the beginners are not getting a break with any puzzles on the easier end of things. How about the editor stepping up and trying to get setters to differentiate between 15*15 and some genuine puzzles for those starting. Not asking for much but maybe a couple a week that are real QC for those that don’t do them in less then 5 minutes.
That’s my moan for today
Good idea, Tim.
Another fail by one clue on the 15 x 15 to go with just failing to beat the SCC cut off on the QC. Very frustrating!
Sounds like you did really well on the 15 x 15 to fail by only one – why no celebration?!
Third time I’ve just missed out. I was pleased with much of my performance, but mucked up a relatively straightforward one. Champagne on ice for when I finish one.
Agree with Cedric’s comments.
I did this after lunch and nodded off mid solve. Total time 28 minutes. LOI PUNISH.
Probably around 20 otherwise.
Some tough stuff here.
COD to LAY ASIDE.
David
I could see what the wordplay should be for 11a but simply couldn’t get MET for satisfied or MEET for group of hunters. A generally hard QC.
5:34
I guess I was just on Pedro’s wavelength today.
Thanks Kitty and Pedro.
Not on the wavelength at all today. Gave up after 20 minutes with 8 outstanding (11ac, 15ac, 16dn and the whole of the NE corner). MER at sequel = result but it had to be right.
FOI – 7ac BRIE
LOI – DNF
COD (of those I solved) – 3dn CINNAMON
Thanks to Pedro and Kitty.
I found the NW and SE corners relatively straightforward, but was forced to wrack my brains good and proper to populate the rest of the grid. After a lengthy barren period, however, I more-or-less biffed WEAPONRY, LAY ASIDE and MILEPOST in quick succession and these provide enough footholds for me to work my way into the SW and NE corners.
I never parsed EMPTY and was very unsure about MEET, but being unable to think of anything better, they went in with fingers crossed. IMPUGN also caused me some doubt, because I realise that I have never really understood the meaning of the word. Some (random) chaps have to lurch through life with only limited vocabulary.
However, with my team now up to (a scarcely believable and vertigo inducing) 5th in the PREMIERship, this one doesn’t mind in the slightest.
Many thanks to Pedro and Kitty.
Another great result over one of the big clubs for 🍒 The decision to take Iraola over O’Neill last summer now looking like a good one esp. as Wolves have now dispensed with the latter’s services.
I found that hard work; the festivities must take their share of the blame, though. Couldn’t parse LOI MAKE at all (desperate biff from “making a market”), and also held up by EXEMPT and INACTION, so it was the NE wot done for me.
Waddled home in 11:37 for a Rotten Day. Many thanks Pedro and Kitty.
22.03 The NW went in quickly but the rest was very slow. I was trying to parse most clues backwards, which I suppose is the sign of a good clue. LOI WEAPONRY. Thanks Kitty and Pedro.
After an encouraging write-in at 1a, I had some stumbles that took me out to 21:30 today: in 1d I got very hung up on the name of a certain politician here in my home country, which fitted the crossers and also had something to do with “top”. It took me a long time to accept IMPUGN as meaning “oppose”. The abandoned bottle at 10a took forever to see. MEET for a group of hunters is not a thing over here, except, I suppose, in rarefied social circles. INACTION started as a biffed INACTIve, which held me up for a while. I liked MILEPOST, PUNISH and BOLERO.
MER at BOT as a web program. To me it’s any program that exhibits vaguely human-like behavior.
Thanks to Pedro and Kitty!
Agree with you on Impugn – it’s in the dictionary and it made sense, but I still expect the QC to be first definitions, not the ones labeled ‘obsolete’.
I often expect it too, but experience is teaching me that I might as well stop expecting it!
Well, that was bracing 😬. Finally finished in 33:20, which is roughly double my normal time these days. Add me to the list of people who haven’t seen “regularly” used like that before – no doubt it’s perfectly fair, but I do hope that it doesn’t become a trend. I find it hard enough deciding which alternate set of letters to omit, without having to guess the interval too.
Thank you for the blog!
Dnf…
Totally off the wavelength today and couldn’t get anywhere near finishing – the NE corner proving particularly stubborn. A shame as I’d been doing pretty well for the last few weeks. I’ll blame having to rush in order to get out to do some last minute Christmas shopping.
FOI – 7ac “Brie”
LOI – dnf
COD – 17dn “Bolero”
Thanks as usual!
17m
Found this very difficult. Abandoned bottle = empty, bored = weary etc
LOsI streep, exempt.
CsOD milepost and boler0.
DNF
Around 8 minutes for all bar WEAPONRY. Just couldn’t see it after 5 minutes even though I had the PON bit. I just didn’t posit A as a possible third letter as I couldn’t think of a word starting _EE, by its sound. Other vowel sounds available!
Thanks Kitty/Pedro
Ps the eyebrows were in pretty permanent raised position…
Enjoyed this one a lot, some really nice clues. Definitely on Pedro’s wavelength today. Especially liked 3d.
Thanks Pedro and Kitty
Slow and steady won the race. I seemed to be on the wavelength for this, certainly found it easier than one or two last week. Maybe cracking the 15×15 today got my brain warmed up.
Thanks to blogger and setter.
Chewy but tasty.
I get to the QC only on occasion; since I had extra time to fill, I’m glad I did today. Nice blog, kitty. Nicer time, kitty.
No time, since I did this in at least three parts on my phone & left the timer running between them, but definitely on the slow side. I found this one tough but enjoyable, with enough PDMs to justify the difficulty.
Thanks to Pedro and Kitty.
So many issues with this one: 1) inaction does not mean failing to perform. Failure to perform, maybe, but still. 2) Impugn does not mean oppose. 3) for “Make” deleting regular letters can’t mean 3 and 6? That’s absurd- it has to be 1,3 5 or 2,4,6.
The answers were much easier than the questions😉