Another first time setter – welcome Plench! The rubric read:
Nine clue answers have been thematically affected. Two cases are of a different sort from the rest, and a third item of this type can be found in the grid in appropriate form. Solvers must draw a smooth outline around its nine letters. Numbers in brackets refer to lengths of grid entries.
Easy to understand the puzzle element from the title and the rubric. Not knowing the number of letters to remove nor which clues to remove them from, nor which two were the odd ones out made it more tricky. It turned out to be a good challenge.
We had to remove (chuck) wood from seven clues before entry into the grid, and similarly remove two other items (which turned out to be “chucked” too) leading us to a final item for chucking, hidden in the grid, round which we had to draw a smooth outline.
The seven similar woody items were trees (OAK, ASH, ELM, YEW, DEAL, PINE and TEAK) and the other two items were DISCUS and CABER – both wooden items thrown/tossed. We bloggers always prefer the grid to contain only real words if possible, and this was accomplished with panache!
The final wooden chuckable was a BOOMERANG in an appropriate shape.
There was a lot to admire in the clueing. I particularly liked the linking of “Scary Movie” and cinephiles in 42 across and the two linked musical clues at 17 and 19 down, the Copland clue was particularly good.
{My smooth curve leaves something to be desired – best I could do with the tools available!}
The “woody” clues first.
| Across | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| No. | Clue (definition) | Answer(wood) | Grid | Wordplay |
| 11 | Char’s water boiler Kate ordered and installed, after unwrapping (5) | (TEA-K)ETTLE | ETTLE | [KATE]* + (S)ETTLE(D) (installed “unwrapped”) |
| 21 | I heard warts dissolved with eastern lotions (6) | E(YE-W)ATERS | EATERS | EYE (I heard) + [WARTS E(astern)]* |
| 38 | Guano filth’s all over the place and what’s lighthouse doing? (8) | OUTFL(ASH)ING | OUTFLING | [GUANO FILTH’S]* |
| 42 | Scary Movie, say, left cinephiles shaking, right? (8) | S(PINE)CHILLER | SCHILLER | [L(eft) CINEPHILES R(ight)]* (Excellent clue!) |
| Down | ||||
| No. | Clue (definition) | Answer(wood) | Grid | Wordplay |
| 7 | Grape nectar – the essence of wine-bar’s bubbly (3) | (CABER)NET | NET | [NECTAR (win)E_B(ar’s)]* |
| 22 | Jerry put out some plum and grapefruit (7) | POMP(ELM)OUS | POMPOUS | PO (Jerry) + [SOME PLUM]* |
| 25 | Put out of action after receiving curse? That’s open to debate (5) | (DISCUS)SABLE | SABLE | DISABLE round CUSS |
| 32 | Balkan national is docked – with VAT added that is even rougher (5) | CR(OAK)IER | CRIER | CROA(T) (Balkan national) + KIER (a vat) |
| 35 | Whiskey passed round sporting side is improperly distibuted (4) | MIS(DEAL)T | MIST | MALT (whiskey) round [SIDE]* |
Now the “normal” clues:
| Across | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| No. | Clue (definition) | Answer | Wordplay |
| 1 | Unoriginal material leaving the French juve lead bemused (6, 2 words) | DEJA VU | [JUVE (LE)AD]* (le – the French – removed) |
| 5 | Southern Iceland to follow Scotland’s later sentence structure (7) | SYNESIS | SYNE (Scottish later) + S(outhern) + IS (Iceland IVR) |
| 10 | Dine out (no starter for Ruth, Samuel etc) — hope food isn’t this (8) | INEDIBLE | [DINE]* + (B)IBLE |
| 13 | “The Regulars” in battlefield support (3) | TEE | Every third letter in baTtlEfiEld |
| 15 | Once more, get upset on board defective train (8) | REATTAIN | EAT (upset) in [TRAIN]* |
| 16 | Cor, cut off chap backing as animal bounds (9, 2 words) | HOME RANGE | HOMER (= cor = 11 Hebrew bushels) + (M)AN (cut off chap) + EG (as) reversed |
| 18 | Hearing of yore? (4) | OYER | Oyer is a legal hearing: [YORE]* |
| 22 | Fruit gives energy and zip when eaten (5) | PEPOS | PEPS (gives energy) round O (zero or zip) |
| 24 | Up on the beach after sun shifts across (6) | AHORSE | ASHORE with S(un) shifting to the right. |
| 26 | Furnished for the elderly, almost perfection in fact (6) | BESEEN | Obsolete word for furnished: BES(t) = EEN (in fact) |
| 28 | Old adult periodically seeks watering holes (3) | OASES | O(ld) + A(dult) + SeEkS (periodically seeks) |
| 29 | Covering for the face spoiled a smile (6) | MESAIL | [A SMILE]* |
| 31 | Paint section of Arabic epitaph (4) | BICE | Hidden in AraBIC Epitaph |
| 34 | Arrived in disorganised library that’s lost track, having two Chambers (9) | BICAMERAL | CAME (arrived) in [LIBRA(ry)]* (lost track = RY removed – nice!) |
| 40 | Doctor’s equipment (3) | RIG | Nice double meaning. |
| 41 | Earlier interest in European Union admitting Russia retrospectively (5) | USURE | Obsolete form of usury: EU round RUS all reversed |
| 43 | Broken by extreme pressure, old republic is partitioned (7) | SEPTATE | EP (extreme pressure) in STATE (republic – obs) |
| 44 | Stick — —- on billboard? (6) | ADHERE | AD HERE. Wonderful &lit-ish clue! |
| Down | |||
| No. | Clue (definition) | Answer | Wordplay |
| 1 | As before, father-lasher possibly the first to go the wrong way (5) | DITTO | COTTID is the bullhead aka father-lasher. Remove C and reverse – took a while for the penny to drop here! |
| 2 | A couple of spaces on rear of balcony on the other side (5) | ENEMY | EN + EM (spaces) + (balcon)Y |
| 3 | Military vehicle to move to the right before parking (4) | JEEP | JEE (move horse to the right) +P(arking) |
| 4 | Number following 6 – product of 7 originally (4) | VINO | VI (6) + NO (number). 7 (see above) was CABERNET before removal of CABER – a grape variety. Another excellent clue! |
| 5 | Slimy mud ultimately blocks drain (6) | SLEECH | S (ultimately blockS) + LEECH (drain) |
| 6 | Group of students (mature) plough final in history for a start(4) | YEAR | Final in (histor)Y + EAR (mature (obs) word for a plough) |
| 8 | Put on party with ecstasy (5) | STAGE | STAG (party) + E(cstasy) |
| 9 | Sect members, with no head for business, reorganise it (7) | SENUSIS | [(b)USINESS]* |
| 12 | Vault over this arch one stuck in swamp (6) | LIERNE | I (one) in LERNE (swamp where Hercules killed the Hydra) |
| 14 | Member touring House in Congress is fit (5) | THROE | Shakespearean word for a spasm: TOE (member) round H(ouse of) R(epresentatives) |
| 17 | Perhaps Copland, as Rodeo man, composed avoiding weird modes… (5) | AARON | Copland’s first name: remove MODES from A(S) R(ODE)O (M)AN and “compose” [AROAN]*. Brilliant! |
| 19 | …or, musically, confused Oasis (5) | OSSIA | [OASIS]* |
| 20 | Race over to get money from Beijing (4) | TAEL | LEAT (mill race) reversed |
| 21 | Finally agree to duration as at least two billion years (4) | EONS | 1 EON = 1 billion years: last letters of (agre)E tO duratioN aS |
| 23 | Cavern (dark, gloomy) before what moved people in Magical Mystery Tour? (6) | EREBUS | ERE (before) + BUS (travelled in by the Beatles etc in Magical Mystery Tour) |
| 27 | Need government, once Resistance is quelled (6) | EGENCE | (R)EGENCE (government once) |
| 30 | Be aware, places going up all over island (5, 2 words) | SIT UP | PUTS (places) reversed round I(sland) |
| 33 | Insurance agreement covers tidal flood (5) | EAGRE | Hidden in InsurancE AGREement |
| 36 | No place for easy-going sarcasm (4) | ACID | Remove PL(ace) from (PL)ACID (easy-going) |
| 37 | Give a preliminary payment for real wood(4) | ARLE | [REAL]* Excellent use of “wood” (= mad) as anagram indicator. |
| 39 | Gazelle turned up, nothing odd in open country (3) | LEA | Remove odd letters form gAzElLe and reverse |
Thanks for the blog. I’d never done an Inquisitor before and really enjoyed this work-out (thanks to David). You can only wonder at how much thought and preparation went into the compiling, and admire the end result, with, as you say, proper words all over.
Do not apologise for any of the blog Hihoba! We love all the flashing colours etc.
We enjoyed the puzzle and completed it fairly easily. We had a good laugh when we looked at the next one in the IQ series and noticed the same clue and had a real sense of 1ac and 1d! We thought it was a printing error until we saw the preamble. However we are getting ahead of ourselves here!
Thanks Plench.
Not much traffic on this puzzle – I’d have expected more. It was a fine puzzle, if not overly challenging. And, yes, leaving actual words after “tree” removal is a sign of class. I was stupidly concerned by the lack of symmetry of the BOOMERANG but became quite content (and very knowledgable about asymmetric boomerangs).
And Bertandjoyce (above), I don’t think it’s good to talk about an active puzzle except in a most cursory fashion – I came to “the next one” late.
(The same goes for Ross, comment 13 on the previous blog – keep your powder dry.)
Sorry HG. Given that the Indie crossword isn’t online, anyone doing v2 would know v1 (surely?), so I’d not seen too much of a problem… Anyway, mea culpa. I was surprised by how easy this puzzle was. Joys awaited.
I wish I had seen BertandJoyce’s comment a little earlier. I too assumed it was a printing mistake – and recycled. Then, having seen their comment, I had a mini-odyssey round local libraries to find the magazine.
As for the puzzle, which was fun, I got hung up on the ‘jav’ of deja vu, fully expecting to find a javelin.