Bonjour! I liked this Quiptic: one or two tricky clues to parse, but once you’d reached base camp, the rest was all there to be worked out and the summit was attainable. Just one clue where I am not entirely convinced by the cryptic grammar. Someone will put me right, no doubt.
Abbreviations
cd cryptic definition
dd double definition
(xxxx)* anagram
anagrind = anagram indicator
[x] letter(s) removed
definitions are underlined
Across
1 Lippy‘s extremely messy on side of face
CHEEKY
‘Extremely’ can mean that you have to use the outside two letters of a word, but here it just means the last letter. So it’s CHEEK plus Y.
4 Sweet‘s twice as good in France
BONBON
‘Good’ in French is BON. So if it were twice as good, you’d have a BONBON, or sweetie.
9 With awful heat and thunder, we’re not feeling well
UNDER THE WEATHER
(HEAT THUNDER WERE)* with ‘awful’ as the anagrind. Timely clue, because where I live it’s been pretty uncomfortable these last couple of days.
10 It helps the injured to walk about with companion following routine
CRUTCH
A charade of C for circa or ‘about’, RUT and CH for ‘Companion of Honour’.
11 Cops raid building now and then
SPORADIC
(COPS RAID)* with ‘building’ as the anagrind.
12 Run broken app with electronic side that catches bugs
FLYPAPER
A charade of FLY, (APP)*, E and R for ‘right’.
14 They provide support, as young birds go out
SLINGS
Took me a while to see this one, but it’s fairly clued: it’s [GO]SLINGS.
15 Told stories about FBI to British journalist
FIBBED
A charade of (FBI)*, B and ED.
18 Loiter behind Mum and pretend to be ill
MALINGER
A charade of MA and LINGER.
21 Retired salesmen take over grand hotel for drink
SPRITZER
The ‘salesmen’ are REPS; reverse that and put the posh hotel RITZ inside it, and you’ve got your answer.
22 Look good with old weapon
GLANCE
A charade of G and LANCE.
24 When capital protection falls off, it’s sudden
AT THE DROP OF A HAT
A cd, with the ‘capital’ part of the clue referring to the head.
25 Time to fish on board ship that drifts
STRAYS
An insertion of T and RAY in SS. For newer solvers, ‘on board ship’ often means that you have to insert something into SS, for ‘steamship’.
26 Do the shakes follow the initial rash and burning?
RED-HOT
R for the first letter of ‘rash’ and (DO THE)*
Down
1 Aristocrat loses heart, following brief part in government
CONTROL
This is the one that took me longest to parse. It’s a double deletion: CO[U]NT followed by ROL[E].
2 Chuck out ecstasy and cocaine found in plane
EJECT
You’ve got to know a bit about drugs to do these cryptic jobbies, haven’t you? I’m absolutely certain that Hectence has never been busted for drugs, but here she is prompting you to make a charade of E for ‘ecstasy’ followed by an insertion of C for ‘cocaine’ in JET.
3 Relish being raised on boat
KETCHUP
A charade of KETCH and UP.
5 Demanding single or return to America
ONEROUS
A charade of ONE, OR reversed, and US.
6 Army unit’s rising fuel bill cut by reservists having nitrogen
BATTALION
An insertion of TA for ‘reservists’ in OIL TAB reversed, followed by N for ‘nitrogen’.
7 In want of a sound pummelling!
NEEDING
Sounds like KNEADING, innit?
8 Puzzle‘s a shocker, containing central theme
TEASER
An insertion of E for the middle letter of ‘theme’ in TASER, which would certainly shock you should a member of The Met ever choose to use it on you. I just chose The Met randomly from all the police forces across the country, obviously.
13 Bookmaker sees local woman, 51, before start of race
PUBLISHER
It’s a charade of PUB for ‘local’, LI for the Roman numerals for ’51’, SHE and R for the first letter of ‘race’, but I’m not convinced that the cryptic grammar is telling us to put it all in that order. Am I missing something?
16 Drive old Hillman and set off round bend
IMPETUS
The dear old Hillman IMP is followed by U for a type of ‘bend’ in (SET)*
17 Doddery lady pens last letter in a confused manner
DAZEDLY
An insertion of ZED for the ‘last letter’ in (LADY)*
18 Red planet endlessly circles on pole
MAROON
A charade of MAR[S], OO and N for one of the ‘poles’ on the third rock from the Sun. ‘Red planet’ in the surface is a nice misdirection.
19 Projection gets everything heard by listener
LUGHOLE
A charade of LUG and HOLE, which is a homophone (‘heard’) of WHOLE, gives you a dialect word for an ear.
20 Part of the French Antilles has charm
ENCHANT
Hidden in FrENCH ANTilles.
23 Flooded by a fenland estuary
AWASH
A final charade of A and WASH, which is indeed the estuary into which the Fenlands empty. Be thankful to all those Dutch engineers.
Thank you to Hectence for this morning’s puzzle.
Thanks for the blog, Pierre, and Hectence for the puzzle.
I think 13d works if you play around a bit with the commas: Local PUB + woman SHE [with] 51 before + R.
For me, it’s the order of 1dn that doesn’t seem to work.
Dear old Hillman Imp? Nostalgia is clouding your judgement Pierre. With its rear engine, the thing was lethal. The only interesting thing about it was its all aluminium engine, derived from that for a Coventry Climax fire pump. The heat from the casting process was used to warm the offices.
(My ‘too much information’ light has just come on, so must stop.)
Very nice puzzle – special congratulations to Hectence for managing to get so many great surfaces while managing to stay more-or-less within the confines of the Quiptic (25a seemed a bit convoluted, but I guess even beginners need to learn that “on board ship” means S[something]S eventually).
13d tripped me up too, but once I realised that the “before” only applies to the “51”, it made perfect sense (and what a superb clue – practically a nine-word story).
An enjoyable Quiptic IMHO. The CHEEKY/CONTROL crossers were my last ones in and it took me a while to parse them. The comma after “heart” in the clue for 1dn means that the “following” can just about be interpreted the way it is here, although I can see why Eileen had a quibble about it.
I’m with Eileen on 1d. I needed all the crossers to get it, and the clue still didn’t make sense to me. Thanks, Pierre, for explaining it.
A pleasant and appropriate puzzle with some good surfaces, but some small reservations.
Eileen @1, I agree that the order is clumsy, but I think the clue has to be read as if a few of words are implied: ‘following (there is) a brief part in government’.
Late to the party, thanks Hectence and Pierre.
Largely OK as a Quiptic, but one or two tricky ones. I couldn’t seem to parse the ‘starlings’ in 14; of course they could be old as well as young. 🙁
I suppose in 1d the comma is supposed to give a warning as Andy B@4 suggests but I still agree with Eileen that it is confusing, especially for a Quiptic – and made more difficult by government=CONTROL, which I don’t see is particularly obvious.
KETCHUP made me smile. 🙂
I tried both starlings and nestlings… Thanks for finding the right birdies.
I am another one who wasn’t happy with ‘following’ in 1d. As others said, it can be justified. However, this is a Quiptic and I think clues here should be written in such a way that words like ‘following’ indicate what’s most likely.
Another example is, in my opinion, the clue that made Robi smile – 3d (KETCHUP). If we follow the conventions in Crosswordland [I know, nowadays one must be careful mentioning that 🙂 ] “being raised (UP) on boat (KETCH)” should lead to UPKETCH.
In a Down clue “A on B” is nearly always “A above B” (unlike in an Across clue where it normally means “B+A”). But yes, setters do it both ways around, although in the un-conventional way more in an Across clue than in a Down clue.
Again, this is a Quiptic and I think setters should perhaps do the conventional thing in order not to confuse starting solvers.
This clue (3d) was (initially) even more troublesome for me as I had ??T?H?P which suggested it could end in SHIP.
Having said all this, I think was a nice Quiptic overall.
While I don’t like “the initial rash” for R very much, I was in full admiration of some others like 15ac (great to see that ‘about’ is no padding), 8d (the surface) and 18d (misleading in a sense that I initially thought there was no definition).
Many thanks to Hectence.
And to Pierre for another excellent blog.