A pretty tough Beelzebub this week, I found. I think the fact that the four 12-letter longer words around the perimeter were all unfamiliar to me made it tougher to break into the grid. In fact, reading through the answers now, there’s a lot of unfamiliar material.
The full parsing for 3dn escapes me for the time being.
*=anag, []=dropped, <=reversed, hom=homophone, cd=cryptic definition, dd=double definition.
| Across | |
|---|---|
| 1 | EPACRIDACEAE – CAPE< + ((ACE + A) in RIDE). |
| 10 | UROMERE – OMER in URE. |
| 12 | RIVA – RIVA[l]. |
| 13 | MAINLINER – (IN LINE) in MAR. |
| 14 | HETE – HET + E. |
| 16 | TRITHIONATE – I in (THE TAR ON IT)*. |
| 17 | UTAH – U + HAT<. |
| 19 | ECDYSIS – [newlywe]D in (SYCE< + IS). |
| 21 | SENHORA – (HEAR SON)*. |
| 22 | AMNT – N in AMT. “Amn’t” is a contraction of “am not” which is commonly heard in Scotland. |
| 23 | INCUNABULAR – (I CURB ANNUAL)*. |
| 26 | ANTE – A N[o]TE. |
| 28 | DISTRAILS – DIS + TRAILS. |
| 29 | AERY – A[p]ERY. |
| 30 | LETHEAN – THE in LEAN. |
| 31 | ELEEMOSYNARY – (ALMONER YES YE[s])*. |
| Down | |
| 1 | EUPHAUSIIDAE – both UP (“in an excited state”) and Au (“gold”) in (SEA I HIDE)*. |
| 2 | PREE – PREE[n]. |
| 3 | A ONTRANCE – I’m not sure about this one. I think we have A for “America”, and perhaps the political party is the ANC, but I can’t get further than that. The full clue is What’s fantastic about political party following America to the bitter end?. |
| 4 | REACTIONARY – RE A [di]CTIONARY. |
| 5 | IRISHER – IRIS + HER. |
| 6 | DENY – DEN[sit]Y. |
| 7 | CRIB – R in C.I.B. |
| 8 | AVERTIN – AVER + TIN. |
| 9 | EARNEST-PENNY – EAR + NEST + PEN + N.Y. |
| 11 | BLOOD-GUILTY – (GOOD BUT ILL) + [ver]Y. |
| 15 | TASMAN SEA – (MAN in TASS) + EA. |
| 18 | TENNIEL – I in (TENNÉ + L). |
| 20 | CABBIES – C + [t]ABBIES. |
| 24 | STYE – EY[o]T’S<. |
| 25 | LALO – [vio]LA LO[udly]. I believe the composer to be Édouard Lalo. |
| 27 | TSAR – RAST[a]<. |
Hi Simon
For 3dn: Try A OUTRANCE with OUTRE = fantastic
Beat me to it.
Indeed a tough one. Just couldn’t get 1ac and 1dn, which also meant I could get a lot of the crossing clues in the top left corner. Worst showing for months for me. But I did know ELEEMOSYNARY, just couldn’t remember how to spell it.