Space Invaders by Shark
The unclued 1ac hints at why only one of the barred-off corners should be filled in. Clashes in the grid must be resolved to form a relevant three-word phrase; this must be accomplished ensuring no more than one letter per cell and creating real words or proper nouns in the final grid.
As often happens with these things, the south-east corner started to crumble first and 27a gave me my first clash. I immediately noticed that the clash was on the NE-SW diagonal. Then, on further investigation, I realised that the whole of that diagonal was fully checked. A quantum leap, I know but I was sure that I was on to something – especially since there was only one barred-off corner, as per the instructions.
Even with that new-found (albeit suppositional) knowledge, I still found some of the clues a bit tricky. I was pretty sure that 14a was UNWIND but I had to seek help. I’m sure that I justified 2d during the solving process but it eludes me now.
Anyway, the clashes, which were all on the diagonal led to:
| Cell | a1 | b2 | c3 | d4 | e5 | f6 | g7 | h8 | i9 | j10 | k11 | l12 |
| Across | 8 | 11 | 14 | 16 | 18 | 25 | 27 | 31 | 35 | 37 | 38 | |
| (T) | L | T | U | S | R | U | M | P | I | N | Y | |
| Down | 1 | 12 | 2 | 3 | 20 | 15 | 27 | 22 | 32 | 33 | 28 | |
| (T) | W | O | I | Y | C | O | R | N | A | P | R |
Adding a T in cell a1 gives us the phrase, TWO IS COMPANY. There we have it, job done – what a disappointing end.
BUT WAIT. How many of these crosswords have you done? Don’t you know by now that if there’s any kind of nagging doubt then you are NOT FINISHED?
I went to bed with TWO IS COMPANY on my mind and wondered why it had the word “is” rather the more usual apostrophe S. And, what did 1a GOOSEBERRY have to do with anything. I was aware of the phrase “playing gooseberry” but didn’t know how to apply it.
I pondered it the next day and out of the blue, it struck me. If two is company then three’s a crowd. If we insert yet a third letter into each cell in the diagonal, we create more new words, which are valid for both across and down answers. And that brings us back nicely to GOOSEBERRY.
Stunning stuff from Shark after the initial feeling of dissatisfaction.
My last blog of 2017 – though I am due to do IQ1523 on December 30th, for publication in January. So Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, Happy Holidays to all readers. And especial thanks to Gaufrid for his tight running of fifteensquared – where would we be without it?
| Across |
|||
| Clue |
Entry |
Adjusted Entry | Wordplay |
| 8 Stroke singular facial feature (5) |
SLASH | SHASH | Singular+LASH (facial feature) |
| 9 In places, mag comprises container for Crocs (7) |
GAVIALS | GAS (mag [chatter], locally) containing VIAL (container) | |
| 11 Reviewing replacement of Web’s first noun with verb (7) |
VETTING | VERTING | nETTING (web) Noun replaced by Verb |
| 13 Drive away direct from shower, short of time (5) |
EXPEL | EX (direct from)+PELt (shower; minus Time) | |
| 14 Cut open boxes to get oneself veg (6) |
UNWIND | ENWIND | UNDo (open; cut) containing WIN (to get oneself) |
| 16 Composer lets go of socially acceptable fake jewels made from this (6) |
STRASS | STRAES | STRAuSS (composer) minus U (socially acceptable) |
| 17 Laugh finally at nurse’s curtailed care (5) |
TE-HEE | aT nursE (finally)+HEEd (care; curtailed) | |
| 18 Tense ship worker (6) | TOILER | TOILES | Tense+OILER (ship) |
| 21 Blocking manoeuvres bit by bit, line stands (6) |
EASELS | EASES (manoeuvres bit by bit) containing Line | |
| 23 Old bird’s cross after intermittent picking at biryani (4) |
IYNX | bIrYaNi (intermittently)+X (cross) | |
| 25 Agitated right before being sacked (7) |
ROUSTED | ROASTED | Right+OUSTED (sacked) |
| 26 Fit uniform in one’s own time (4) |
AGUE | AGE (one’s own time) containing Uniform | |
| 27 Fit in with lacklustre children (5) |
MATCH | CATCH | MAT (lacklustre)+CHildren |
| 29 Fit body’s at last muscly in pursuit of power (4) |
ARMY | ARM (power)+musclY (at last) | |
| 31 Twice work in foul, thick matter found in Mississippi (4) |
GOOP | GOOR | GO (work)+OP (work) |
| 34 70 involved in corrupt South Kiwi war (6) |
STOUSH | Seventy+SOUTH (anag: corrupt) | |
| 35 King’s barge touring Italy (5) | PRIAM | PRO-AM | PRAM (barge) containing Italy |
| 36 Nice suburb: place that cuts destruction (8) |
BANLIEUE | LIEU (place) inside BANE (destruction) | |
| 37 Unmarried twin – liberated catholic! (4) |
LONE | LOWE | cLONE minus Catholic |
| 38 Warren is Clyde initially in supporting part? (9) |
UNDERCLAY | UNDERCLAD | UNDERLAY (supporting part) containing Clyde (initially) |
| Down |
|||
| 1 Great including description of London’s former county (5) |
GWENT | GHENT | GT (great) containing WEN (description of London) |
| 2 Primarily identical to stomatal? This could be but not with condensed fruit (6) |
OSTIAL | OSTEAL | Sorry – I don’t have a clue on this one 🙁
See comment 2 (below) |
| 3 Shot round wearing satin, perhaps (5) |
SHINY | SHINE | SHY (shot) containing IN (wearing) |
| 4 Land no King (or Queen for that matter) in card game (3) |
BAG | BrAG (card game) missing R (King or Queen) | |
| 5 Ask about National horse race (5) |
EVENT | National inside EVET (same as EFT, which is a young NEWT; ASKis same as ASKER, which is a NEWT) – phew! | |
| 6 Record music cover (8, 2 words) |
RAP SHEET | RAP (music)+SHEET (cover) | |
| 7 Surveyor finds it useful Academy’s shifted 24 places in exam (6) |
Y-LEVEL | a-LEVEL (exam) with A shifted 24 places in the alphabet, making Y | |
| 8 Deer crosses immense tract? Indeed, crosses (9) |
SVASTIKAS | SIKAS (deer [plural]) containing VAST (immense tract) | |
| 10 Most sneaky flams admitted by mum (6) |
SLIEST | LIES (flams) inside ST (mum [quiet]) | |
| 12 Paddling round under short tree (6) |
OARING | RARING | OAk (tree; short)+RING (round) |
| 15 Doctrinaire cycling guide contains old look, heading electronic (9) |
IDEOLOGUE | IDEALOGUE | GUIDE (anag: cycling) containing Old+LO (look) Electronic (heading) |
| 19 With greed, say, father brought up protein from gut (7) |
EREPSIN | PERE (father; rev: brought up)+SIN (greed, say) | |
| 20 Hacked local fellow getting over huge upset (7) |
COUGHED | SOUGHED | COD (local fellow) containing HUGE (anag: upset) |
| 22 Laurel tree left in place, young not dead (4) |
STAN Stan Laurel |
STAR | STANd (a young tree left standing) minus Dead |
| 24 Yell terms of endearment? Perhaps backfiring, having received trick (6) |
YARTAS Yell is a Shetland island |
ART (trick) inside SAY (perhaps) all reversed: backfiring | |
| 27 Decoy heading off right (5) | ROPER | COPER | pROPER (right; without its heading) |
| 28 Pigeon’s instinctive behaviour with rook trailing behind (5) |
HOMER | HOMED | HOME (instinctive behaviour)+Right I’m not sure about the “legality” of this clue since HOME and HOMER are under the same headword in Chambers. Or have I missed something? |
| 30 Jazz pianist who’s taken orders? (4) |
MONK Thelonious Monk |
Double definition, really. A MONK has taken holy orders. | |
| 32 Can kick one’s heels up if disheartened (4) |
GAOL | GOOL | GAmbOL (kick one’s heels up; disheartened) |
| 33 Bark at nursing secretary from down under (4) |
TAPA | TAWA | AT containing PA (secretary) rev: from down under |
Happy Christmas etc to you too Kenmac. Thanks for all the great blogs!
I found this very tough and, like you kenmac, was a little dissatisfied with the cluing – although most of that dissatisfaction was allayed in the end as I picked through the clues (and thank you for explaining 22D, which I just couldn’t see). I agree about 28D and also wonder if there’s something I’m missing still, as everything else seems to have fallen in place.
However, the dissatisfaction was more than made up for by the wonderful twist at the end (which unfortunately was spoiled for me when I googled VEOTING to see if it was a place somewhere and one of the few hits to come up was a comment on another blog [grrrr] which had enough of a hint in the google result to spoil the surprise).
2D is an anagram of i + to s[tomat]al. Ostial and stomatal are synonymous, so the whole clue is an &lit.
Thanks to Shark and season’s greetings to kenmac, and all.
Seasonal thingies to Shark, Kenmac and everyone! I was delayed by a too-hasty insertion of SWASTIKAS rather than its V spelling at 8D, but eventually (with the deviously clued STAN the last answer to succumb) reduced myself to the above-described condition of nagging doubt. It was TOILEC in particular that convinced me that TWO IS COMPANY couldn’t work. Much time was spent trying to extract sense from different choices of clashing letters before – about a day later – the Third Way was suddenly revealed. Very neat. Applause.
I found this more straightforward than the previous few weeks, though with a sting in the tail with that “two is company” trap lying in wait. Thoroughly enjoyable throughout.
Happy Christmas Kenmac. 🙂
I too had SWASTIKA to start with, on the basis that WAST(E) might be an endless desert expanse, until I remembered an American I had once heard of called Svastich … but I wasn’t bothered by STA(N), as we have a grandson named as such by his dad, a great L&H fan.
What I did find misleading, however, was the phrase “Clashes in the grid must be resolved” … usually that means choosing either one or the other of two letters. But in this case VEOTING and TOILEC were neither real words nor proper nouns ? Yet the alternative THREE’S COMPANY, which I finally plumped for with some diffidence, meant some of the clash pairs being discarded for a totally different letter, to make real words or proper nouns, e.g Ghent, and Lowe (presumably of musicals fame ?)
Maybe “This must be accomplished with any single letter in the cell, to create real words …” would have been more helpful ?
Apart from that, a clever and challenging puzzle. Thanks, setters, bloggers and posters and merry X(word)mas to you all.
Well I fell for the trick and left it at TWO IS COMPANY down the diagonal. Call me Mr Thicko from Thicksville, but I don’t really understand:
(a) how GOOSEBERRY/THREE’S A CROWD signifies that only one of the barred-off corners should be filled in
(b) how we were supposed to know that TWO IS COMPANY, with GOOSEBERRY providing a hint at the whole proverb, wasn’t the right answer. The preamble says “real words” rather than “all real words” and TWO IS COMPANY could be said to fulfil that.
I’d appreciate some enlightenment please! Such is the quality of this series that I can’t believe that the pointer to the last stage is simply “that seems too easy there must be something more.”
I enjoyed this, though, like Kenmac, started in the bottom right corner – always a pain! A setter friend said that the last down and across clues tended to be easier as the setter set them last, and had run out of fiendish plots. I’ve no idea if this is true, not being a setter!
I confess to having solved it without having even noticed that “Two is company” was even a possibility. After getting gooseberry I was looking for the phrase anyway and found that the first few letter clashes resolved to a third letter.
I think (pardon me if I’m wrong) that in your preamble you mean that all the letters on the diagonal were checked, not unchecked.
I’m blogging on on the run-up to Christmas, so, like Kenmac, my next blog won’t appear until 2018, so MC and HNY to editor, bloggers, setters and commenters.
[I need the preview function – my bold tag may go horribly wrong]
I absolutely loved this puzzle. Great PDM once I realised TWO IS COMPANY had to be changed and what a great construction by Shark to create the grid in such a way.
@6 – I’m not sure how you could have thought TWO IS COMPANY could stay as it was when, as someone else said, VEOTING isn’t a word, so would not have fit with the preamble – it was that incongruity that I think was the necessary key to deducing that an entirely different phrase had to be inserted
Bingybing, what I was trying to say was that the letters of TWO IS COMPANY lead to a real word in at least one of the entries in each clashing pair, and as the preamble states that the resolution leads to real words rather than leads to ONLY real words, it isn’t that unreasonable to assume that one should choose the clashing letters which form the message and provide at least one real word in the process. Murray makes a very good point that “clashes must be resolved” is a bit misleading. After 20+ years of solving this sort of puzzle (mostly in the Listener) I have found that resolving clashes usually involves
(a) choosing one of the clashing letters
(b) deleting both letters
(c) replacing the letters with the letter that is halfway between them or the “sum” of both letters etc.
What’s more it isn’t that uncommon for resolutions of clashes to lead to some, but not all, of the resulting entries being recognisable words.
I’m not criticising the setter or the puzzle, and I’m certainly suggesting that my solution should be considered correct. Perhaps if I understood why only one of the barred-off corners should have been filled in (other than its being on the diagonal with the final message) I would see more clearly how the endgame is being indicated?
Last para should be “…certainly NOT suggesting…” sorry.
I always thought that the final clause ruled out leaving it at ‘Two is Company’, what with ‘toilec’ etc; maybe writing ‘only real words’ would have been more definitive. Fortunately, the correct phrase came to me very soon after spotting Two is Company – I was dreading the laborious phase where you have to go through all the possible alternative words… The brilliance and ingenuity of this resolution (I think ‘resolved’ is fair enough) made up for quite a lot of cluing quibbles. I never did finish the top right corner, having entered ‘top sheet’ (it sort of makes sense) for 6D.
I also don’t see that the T is a gooseberry to the two empty cells.
Many thanks to Shark for a tough challenge and kenmac.
A miserable failure from me. I managed to solve about two-thirds of the clues and then ground to a halt. Such a shame as I can see from kenmac’s post that this was a spectacular construction. I can imagine how satisfying it would be to get this one out.
Thanks to Shark and kenmac.
I didn’t find this too hard apart from the fiendish (and very clever) clue to UNWIND and some entries in the SE corner, including the equally tricky clue to GAOL. Is kenmac’s parsing correct? Does ‘gambol’ mean ‘kick ones heels up’? I was persuaded that it was LOLLYGAG (to idle/loiter)disheartened and reversed.
I very nearly fell into the trap. Rather like kenmac, I entered TWO IS COMPANY, felt a tad disappointed and put it aside, then started worrying about TOILEC (at that stage I hadn’t noticed VEOTING). Fortunately I found no arcane author or artist called TOILEC, finally, after some time, I confess, twigging it was the other half of the saying that was needed. A very clever endgame that added a large dollop of spice to the puzzle.
The preamble was deceptive rather than unfairly misleading in my opinion. The puzzle reminded me of that wonderful Schadenfreude Listener, Misprinted Choice, in which many solvers were misled into entering the wrong choices from clashes on the diagonal.
My last two in were 5d EVENT (with “ask” = “newt” = “eft” = “evet”) and the intersecting 14a UNWIND. But the ‘no more than one letter per cell’ and ‘creating real words or proper nouns in the final grid’ led me fairly promptly from TWO IS COMPANY to THREE’S A CROWD.
Still a bit puzzled by how GOOSEBERRY hints at ‘why only one of the barred-off corners should be filled in’. Are the other two the ‘company’ and that one would make ‘a crowd’?
Andy Stewart @13: I had the same parsing as kenmac for GAOL; I don’t think that idle/loiter are synonyms of ‘kick one’s heels up’.
Searching back, Inquisitor 1259 (Clashes by Xanthippe) had clashes that were ‘resolved appropriately so that all entries are real words’ – each pair of clashing letters was replaced by a third letter to read
————-
SPOILER ALERT
————-
A THIRD WAY.
How rude of me … thanks to kenmac for the blog, and Shark for another sharp (as in nifty) puzzle. I’ll save greetings of the season for my blog next week.
Re the solitary filled corner, I was left to suppose that the “two” are off enjoying themselves leaving the gooseberry. But a bit weak in contrast to the rest of the puzzle.
One more try to post this message, which the site keeps refusing, saying I’ve already posted it, but i doesn’t appear as posted.
HolyGhost @15, I didn’t see the entry in Chambers, “kick up one’s heels,” meaning to gambol (never heard the expression before) hence my alternative parsing. I now realize that kenmac’s explanation is the intended one (sorry for doubting you, kenmac), but I think my parsing is also justifiable. “Kick one’s heels” means to do nothing, i.e. idle; ‘up’ is a reverser in a down clue, so LO(llyg)AG< gives GAOL.
I thought GOOSEBERRY was a pretty good pointer to the phrase that resolved the clashes. It seemed clear to me that the two blanks were the companions who didn't want a third joining them.