The mysterious Beale returns to the Quiptic slot this week with an enjoyable puzzle that may cause a little head-scratching in places.
I say ‘mysterious’ because the profile on the Guardian site informs us only that ‘Beale is a crossword setter’. The Crossword Who’s Who on the Best for Puzzles site is similarly coy, telling us only that ‘Beale is a setter of Quiptic crosswords’. I never came top of my class at school but I think I knew that already. Perhaps Quiptic regulars know more.
I’d be interested to know how difficult newcomers to cryptic crosswords found this. It wasn’t all plain sailing for me, especially in the NW corner, where there seemed to be a lot of clues requiring deletions.
I have put ‘canoodling’ at the top of my to-do list for today. 🙂
| Across | ||
| 7 | CASUALTY |
Victim unconcerned when they take man away (8)
CASUAL (unconcerned) and a deletion (take … away) of HE (man) from THEY. It took some head-scratching to see exactly how this one worked
|
| 9 | TROPHY |
Work hard in attempt to get prize (6)
OP (work) H (hard) contained by (in) TRY (attempt)
|
| 10 | ONUS |
Head boy ducks out of extra responsibility (4)
A deletion (ducks out of) of B (head boy) from BONUS (extra)
|
| 11 | FASCINATED |
Intricate fast dance holds one spellbound (10)
An anagram (intricate) of FAST DANCE around (holding) I (one)
|
| 12 | CHERRY |
Her cry moves the stony-hearted (6)
An anagram (moves) of HER CRY for a nicely whimsical definition
|
| 14 | ARMOURED |
Protected me with ardour when agitated (8)
An anagram (when agitated) of ME and (with) ARDOUR
|
| 15 | PISTOL |
Colt spoilt with mistreatment (6)
An anagram (with mistreatment) of SPOILT
|
| 17 | ORNATE |
Far from simple to speak without direction (6)
ORATE (to speak) around (without, i.e. outside) N (direction, i.e. north)
|
| 20 | CANOODLE |
Get intimate with old doctor in narrow boat (8)
An anagram (doctor) of OLD inside (in) CANOE (narrow boat). What a lovely word ‘canoodle’ is
|
| 22 | HEYDAY |
They head off with 24 hours to reach the peak (6)
A deletion (head off) of T (the first letter) from THEY next to (with) DAY (24 hours)
|
| 23 | ROAD ROLLER |
Wave on the way to get heavy equipment (4,6)
ROLLER (wave) next to (on) ROAD (the way)
|
| 24 | ALTO |
Echoes note to singer (4)
I’m not sure of the parsing here. I think it may be a reversal (echoes) of LA (note) plus TO (to). I’m not sure I’ve seen ‘echo’ used as a reversal indicator before
|
| 25 | KENNEL |
Man meets another returning home for dog (6)
KEN (man) next to (meets) a reversal (returning) of LEN (another, i.e. another man)
|
| 26 | HAS-BEENS |
Eats vegetables — sounds like they are past their best (3-5)
A homophone (sounds like) of HAS BEANS (eats vegetables)
|
| Down | ||
| 1 | PAWNSHOP |
It lends optimism mainly to exploited people (8)
A deletion (mainly) of E (the last letter) from HOPE (optimism) next to PAWNS (exploited people)
|
| 2 | FUSS |
Comes together without last-minute trouble (4)
A deletion (without) of E (last minute) from FUSES (comes together)
|
| 3 | FLUFFY |
It’s not hard to get down at start of year (6)
FLUFF (down) next to (at) Y (start of year)
|
| 4 | STRIMMER |
Garden tool‘s more streamlined (8)
S (‘s) TRIMMER (more streamlined)
|
| 5 | VOCABULARY |
Speaker’s choice unsettling Lucy with a “bravo” (10)
An anagram (unsettling) of LUCY and (with) A BRAVO
|
| 6 | CHEESE |
Some lychee served as final course (6)
An answer hidden in (some) LYCHEE SERVED
|
| 8 | YES-MAN |
By unknown means, upset docile character (3-3)
An anagram (upset) of MEANS next to (by) Y (unknown)
|
| 13 | RESPONDENT |
Wrongly pretend son is the one with the answers (10)
An anagram (wrongly) of PRETEND SON
|
| 16 | OLD-WORLD |
It’s not American to be quaintly attractive (3-5)
A cryptic cum double definition. A reference to America often being described as the new world in contrast to Europe, the old one
|
| 18 | EXACTING |
Performing with former partner is difficult (8)
EX (former partner) next to (with) ACTING (performing)
|
| 19 | HEALTH |
Condition of student found in open countryside (6)
L (student) inside (found in) HEATH (open countryside)
|
| 21 | APOGEE |
Go ape out East for a climax (6)
An anagram (out) of GO APE plus E (East)
|
| 22 | HARASS |
Pester son and girl to go back (6)
A reversal (to go back) of S (son) and SARAH (girl)
|
| 24 | ABET |
Encourage to be offbeat (4)
An anagram (off) of BEAT. Not everyone thinks this kind of clue is fair, because you need to split ‘offbeat’ into two words in order to get the anagram indicator ‘off’ and the anagram fodder ‘beat’
|
I thought that there were plenty of clues here that would have been more suitable in the main puzzle rather than a Quiptic. That’s not to say I didn’t enjoy it because I did, but when a Quiptic is harder than, say, a Chifonie cryptic, then it isn’t doing what it says on the tin. The crossing clues for ALTO and ABET certainly fall into that category, and I parsed ALTO the same way as newmarketsausage. My LOI was CASUALTY and it also took me a while to see how it worked.
Likewise – this was much harder than Rufus today.
Thanks Beale & nms.
Yes, a bit tricky for a Quiptic. I was left with the 24’s until the end. I can’t find ‘echo’ in reversal indicator lists but I suppose it does sort of indicate a ‘going back.’
Thanks Beale and newmarketsausage.
Found this puzzle enjoyable, but quite hard, so appreciated the blog.
FLUFFY had me flummoxed.
See there is a “lift and separate” clue at 24d, I missed it, but people will be more awake to them soon. Think novelties in the clue line good, don’t want the procedure to become fossilized.
Very late coming to this as I’m a newcomer and am currently going backwards through all the Quiptics. In answer to your question NMS : I found this at times – almost simplistic – at other times I have come up with the answer but can not see how on earth it was derived. I thought each clue was a mixture of a quick clue and cryptic clue – the quick one being sometimes very obvious, the cryptic parsing being mostly very difficult – some were ok. But then I am still using the ‘check this’ button a lot.