A mixed bag today with some very easy clues and some that required a little more thought. Overall, probably tending towards the simpler end of the FT range of difficulty (unlike yesterday’s). A few of the of the clues/answers have word associations that are difficult to justify by strict dictionary definitions (it depends upon one’s degree of pedantry 🙂 but this is only a minor quibble since it does not affect the ‘solvability’.
Across
1 CORONATION CO (company) ON (performing) in RATION (budget)
6 EDIT DIET with ‘E’ brought forward
9 SUPERSONIC US reversed PERSON IC
10 PSIS PS (letter’s ending) IS – the problem is that a letter doesn’t always end with a PS
12 ROLLING STONE ROLLING (playing trill) *(NOTES)
15 ECLAMPSIA *(IM PLACES) – acute toxaemia with convulsive fits in the last three months of pregnancy
17 RURAL *(R[eg]ULAR)
18 ARSON A R SON (issue)
19 OVERNIGHT H GIN reversed in OVERT (in public) – ‘hence, extraordinarily quickly’ according to Chambers
20 MARKET FORCES *(MERK[el] FORECAST) – ‘mostly’ would normally indicate removal of only the last letter
24 ROOD homophone of ‘rude’
25 VOCIFERATE *(VOT[e] A FIERCE)
26 LIST LIS[z]T
27 BRASS TACKS cd
Down
1 CASE dd
2 RIPE alternate letters in ‘fRuIt PiE’
3 NARROW-MINDED *(MONDRIAN DREW)
4 TROLL R in TOLL
5 ORIENTATE *(NEAR TO [s]ITE)
7 DISCOURAGE DISC OUR AGE
8 TESSELLATE *(SETTLE SEAL)
11 ESTRANGEMENT hidden in ‘remotEST RANGE MEN Took’ – ‘descending in’ only works if the whole clue is written downwards rather than just the answer
13 RED ADMIRAL RED (embarrassed) AD (promotion) MIRA (star) L (left) – ‘vanessa’ is a butterfly of the red admiral genus
14 CLASSROOMS CLASS (stylish) ROOMS (offices)
16 SHOP FLOOR cd
21 RUINS I in RUNS
22 NARC RAN reversed C
23 MESS MESS[age]
A pre-breakfast blog today? Quite a mixed bag, I agree. ‘Vanessa’ as a butterfly was new to me. I’m surprised she doesn’t appear in more puzzles. I was held up by 7d by trying to fit in ‘disconcert’. Also tried ‘trout’ for 4d but couldn’t make it work.
A pre-breakfast blog today?”
No, I had my toast and coffee at about 5am so it is coming up to lunchtime now!
I liked a number of these clues, particularly 7d (21st century for “our age”).
Took me forever to figure out that 11d (“estrangement”) was a hidden, rather than an anagram of some set of words in the clue.
I didn’t like the use of “to” as an instruction in 6a (“promoting drug to try to lose weight is correct”). You are promoting the letter “E” *in* the word “DIET,” so wouldn’t the clue have been better as “promoting drug in attempt to lose weight is correct”?
Excellent puzzle, a little trickier than average FT. Re MARKET FORCES, you’re right that mostly is usually only one letter off, but it’s logical here (four out of six) and clear enough from the wordplay. Not sure if they’re what they used to be, those MARKET FORCES, tho. Kicking myself for not seeing the hidden ESTRANGEMENT for ages.
Hi Agentzero
Funnily enough, unlike both you and Nmsindy, 11d was one of the first to go in for me (I had a change today and did the down clues first).
I agree with your quibble about 6a and under normal circumstances I would probably have commented on it but as I already had _D_T, and the answer was obvious, I didn’t pay too much attention to the clue at the time (not helped by the fact that it was about 5:30am!).