I found this quite tough.
Either I’m entering holiday mode a bit early or this was hard, or possibly both, as at a bit over 12 minutes this is my slowest solve in a while. The answers contain little in the way of obscurity, so the difficulty all came from tricksy cluing and effective misdirection (along with a couple of lesser-seen abbreviations) that would not be out of place in the 15×15.
I was rather slow all over the grid, but my main hold ups at the end were the 1d/7ac crossers and both the 17’s. A very enjoyable challenge – many thanks to Joker!
| Across | |
| 1 | My career churning in butter factory (8) |
| CREAMERY – anagram (churning) of MY CAREER | |
| 5 | Spot a line missing in voting paper (4) |
| BLOT – A and L(ine) missing in BALLOT (voting paper) | |
| 9 | Promised the return of northern banks (5) |
| SWORN – the return/reverse of N(orthern) and ROWS (banks). As in a bank or row of dials, switches, etc. I couldn’t get past the deeply unpromising idea of “banks” being a containment indicator. | |
| 10 | Father’s holding a winning card, which makes all well (7) |
| PANACEA – PA (father) is holding AN ACE (a winning card) | |
| 11 | Animal trapped in the well (3) |
| EWE – hidden, or “trapped” in thE WEll. Whereas I was slow to see the actual containment indicator. | |
| 12 | Show changing time on map (9) |
| PANTOMIME – anagram (changing) of TIME ON MAP | |
| 13 | Chap turned back before a place in Cambridgeshire specifically (6) |
| NAMELY – MAN (chap) “turned back” before ELY (crossword’s favourite place in Cambridgeshire) | |
| 15 | Down-and-out, mostly rough-edged bachelor returned (6) |
| BEGGAR – RAGGEd (rough-edged, “mostly”) B(achelor) “returned” | |
| 17 | Try and move round to hide key symptom of indigestion (9) |
| HEARTBURN -HEAR (try) and TURN (move round) to hide B (key in music) | |
| 19 | Be unsuccessful getting rid of large peacock (3) |
| FOP – FLOP (be unsuccessful) getting rid of L(arge) | |
| 20 | A right pair mostly exercise hard (7) |
| ARDUOUS – A R(ight) DUO and USe (exercise) “mostly” | |
| 21 | British countryside is rather insipid (5) |
| BLAND – B(ritish) LAND (countryside) | |
| 22 | Merit attention before the third of June (4) |
| EARN – EAR (attention) before N (the “third” of juNe) | |
| 23 | End of stay after prison sentence able to be lengthened (8) |
| STRETCHY – Y (“end” of staY) after STRETCH (prison sentence) | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Island seabird seen below Cape reservoir? (7) |
| CISTERN – IS. (Island) TERN (seabird) seen below C. (Cape). I almost gave myself a nice big pat on the back for remembering that a CAITERN is a small, possibly artificial mountain lake (or something like that – possibly same derivation as TARN). | |
| 2 | Insect leaving gnu, say, to run off (5) |
| ELOPE – ANY (insect) leaves antELOPE (gnu, say) | |
| 3 | Skilful handling of rampant tulip mania working (12) |
| MANIPULATION – anagram (rampant) of TULIP MANIA, and then ON (working) | |
| 4 | Ruin regularly leads writer to mature (5) |
| RIPEN – R u I n “regularly” leads PEN (writer) | |
| 6 | Missing being idle when son’s away (7) |
| LACKING – sLACKING (being idle) when S(on) is away | |
| 7 | Commerce is traditional with English (5) |
| TRADE – TRAD(itional) with E(nglish) | |
| 8 | Disorderly, hungover and unable? Off their heads (12) |
| UNGOVERNABLE – remove the “heads” from hUNGOVER and uNABLE | |
| 14 | Bend in river is more tight around delta (7) |
| MEANDER – MEANER (more tight) around D(elta). Meander derives from the indeed quite tortuous River Maeander. | |
| 16 | Quickly paid running into railway (7) |
| RAPIDLY – anagram (running) of PAID going into RLY (railway) | |
| 17 | Drag bundles of corn endlessly (5) |
| HEAVE – sHEAVEs (bundles of corn) “endlessly” | |
| 18 | Distressed to go down after being at university (5) |
| UPSET – SET (go down, as in the Sun) after UP (being at university) | |
| 19 | Country abandoning European currency (5) |
| FRANC – FRANCe (country) abandoning E(uropean) | |
08:09. COD has to be UNGOVERNABLE, very clever. The rest of the puzzle was very enjoyable with some nice surfaces. Spent quite a while looking at various options for FOP, but got there in the end. With TON in the other crossword, we have started a collection of Regency words. Thanks all!
A disappointing 17 mins.
This was a write in other than CISTERN, ELOPE and SWORN, which took ages. No excuse for not getting ELOPE immediately.
I should have broken 12 minutes, so not happy.
Thanks for the blog.
PS I will make my target with a 12-minute finish tomorrow. I won’t hold my breath 🤣🤣
PPS Solved the big crossword. Took forever!