I think this is the first time I have written a blog for a Peto puzzle. Very enjoyable and made to be accessible without being dull or pedestrian. Thank you Peto.
| Across | ||
| 1 | HAZARD | Difficult to overcome South Africa in this game (6) |
| HARD (fifficult) contains (to overcome) ZA (South Africa) | ||
| 5 | TROLLOPE | Writer of inflammatory online post to manage without a hint of conscience (8) |
| TROLL (writer of inflamatory online post) and cOPE (to manage) missing Concience (first letter, a hint of) – Anthony Trollope, writer. Writer is part of both the the definition and the wordplay which is unusual in a crossword. The defintion is clearly not &lit because of the obvious anachonism. To parse this clue work I have to peform some contorted mental gymnastics with the word “of”. | ||
| 9 | LITERATI | Scholarly people in Italy largely doing an about face to admit it’s by Queen (8) |
| ITALy (largely) reversed (doing an about face) containing (to admit) IT is by ER (The Queen) | ||
| 10 | IGNORE | Pay no heed to a passage from Greer on girls from the east (6) |
| found inside (a passage from) greER ON GIrls reversed (from the East, right-to-left on a map) | ||
| 11 | NASDAQ | Well known retailer in Northern Queensland’s first to get a computerised trading system (6) |
| ASDA (well known retailer) in N (north) Queensland (first letter of) | ||
| 12 | MONGOLIA | State of Oman failing to maintain key production of oil (8) |
| anagram (failing) of OMAN contains (to maintain) G (key, music) and anagram (production) of OIL | ||
| 14 | ELEPHANTS EAR | What about the French head of police standing by workers at an organ-making plant? (9,3) |
| EH (what?) contains (about) LE (the, French) and Police (first letter, head of) then (standing by) ANTS (workers) and EAR (organ) | ||
| 18 | MEETING HOUSE | Enough, it seems, to lose son slaughtered in a place of worship (7,5) |
| anagram (slaughtered) of ENOUGH IT SEEMs missing (to lose) S (son) | ||
| 22 | SPACEMAN | Call back to find odds on Bill becoming an astronaut (8) |
| NAME (call) reversed (back) coming before (to find…?) SP (starting price, odds) on AC (account, bill) | ||
| 25 | HOT AIR | Nonsense poet regularly appearing in musical (3,3) |
| pOeT (regualr selection) in HAIR (the musical) | ||
| 26 | CANOVA | Sculptor of Tin Eggs (6) |
| CAN (tin) and OVA (eggs) | ||
| 27 | FRIPPERY | Tear into fellow salesman over a bit of youthful showiness (8) |
| RIP (tear) inside F (fellow) REP (salesman) on Youthful (first letter, a bit of) | ||
| 28 | REVERSAL | With reference to verse representation of Lear’s adverse change of fortune (8) |
| RE (with reference to) V (verse) and anagram (representation) of LEAR’S | ||
| 29 | ROTTEN | Decaying rubbish starts to turn even nastier (6) |
| ROT (rubbish) and first letters of (starts to) Turn Even Nastier | ||
| Down | ||
| 2 | ANIMAL | I’m gripped by a couple of articles on Leicestershire’s opening bat for instance (6) |
| I’M inside (gripped by) AN and A (a couple of articles of speech) then Leicestershire (opening letter of) | ||
| 3 | AMENDMENT | Alteration to document’s last point accepted by American soldiers over time (9) |
| END (last point) inside (accepted by) AM (Americam) MEN (soldiers) on T (time) | ||
| 4 | DRAG QUEEN | Newspaper piece on daughter of female impersonator (4,5) |
| RAG (newspaper) QUEEN (piece, on chessboard) on D (daughter of) | ||
| 5 | TRIUMPH | Cap worn by Peto before Henry’s victory (7) |
| TRUMP (cap) containing (worn by) I (Peto, the setter) then H (Henry) | ||
| 6 | ORION | Hunter’s moon not massive at first over Rhode Island (5) |
| mOON missing (not) Massive (first letter of) contains (over) RI (Rhode Island) | ||
| 7 | LINGO | Heather’s love of language (5) |
| LING (heather) and O (love, tennis score) | ||
| 8 | PARTISAN | Irregular soldier’s weapon (8) |
| double definition | ||
| 13 | GOT | Caught game against Thailand (3) |
| GO (game) with (against) T (Thailand) | ||
| 15 | NAUGHTIER | Nothing that’s essentially moral is more titillating (9) |
| NAUGHT (nothing) IE (that is) and moRal (essentially, centre letter of) | ||
| 16 | SWEET SPOT | Confectionery and drugs providing an optimum combination of qualities (5,4) |
| SWEETS (confectionary) and POT (drugs, plural?) | ||
| 17 | KEEPSAKE | A reminder to delay having something to drink (8) |
| KEEP (to delay) with SAKE (something to drink, in Japan) | ||
| 19 | ICE | Character in morality play heading off with diamonds (3) |
| vICE (character in morality play) missing first letter (heading off) | ||
| 20 | HANDFUL | Had fun going off to Luxembourg with children that are difficult to control (7) |
| anagram (going off) of HAD FUN then L (Luxembourg) | ||
| 21 | PIERCE | Enter to find fellow talking to a couple from Cephalonia (6) |
| PIER sounds like (talking) “peer” (fellow) with CEphalonia (a couple of letters from) | ||
| 23 | CLOSE | End on very affectionate terms (5) |
| double definition | ||
| 24 | MEANS | Intends to create wealth (5) |
| double definition | ||
*anagram
definitions are underlined
I too messed around with 5a for fun and longer than necessary because Trollope besides being one of my favourite writers was also of course the man who invented the post box, which turned out to be irrelevant but heigh-ho.
I think if you can accept TROLL as a noun meaning ‘an inflammatory online post’ – not too great a stretch these days – then the the ‘writer of’ problem goes away.
Thanks to PeeDee & Peto.
I have not seen troll used as the posting, only as the person doing the posting.
Apparently, it can be used as the verb as well. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_troll)
Thanks Peto and PeeDee
Found this an entertaining puzzle that I did across a couple of half hour sessions. There was nothing particularly hard with it, although the game of HAZARD, the supermarket retailer ASDA and the PARTISAN weapon were all new to me. CANOVA was my first one in but needed to check that he was in fact an old sculptor first.
Thought that there were some very good clues that took a bit of unravelling, including TROLLOPE, LITERATI (that I didn’t completely get and needed help from here) and TRIUMPH.
Finished in the NW corner with NASDAQ (which confirmed that indeed QUEEN was the chess piece of 4d), then DRAG QUEEN and HAZARD the last one to fall.