We were out of the country and without internet access when Wire’s first puzzle was published. When we eventually were able to solve it, we completely missed the theme and it was rather late in the day to welcome Wire to the Indy. We are glad then to have his second puzzle to solve – hopefully Mrs Wire had no complaints this time!
There was a theme in Wire’s first puzzle but we couldn’t find one today. Quite a few of the clues had us puzzled – partly down to our errors as in 18d and 14ac. We sorted out the parsing together – AB in DIET and ES but when BERT sounded it out in his head he had DI -AB – ETES and couldn’t work out what the illness was until he said it out loud and we both laughed.
We’d never heard of TOLLUND MAN (11ac) but again we solved it from the wordplay.
Thanks Wire – Welcome to the Indy.
Across
7 Infiltration of Coventry is militant (8)
ENTRYISM
Hidden in the clue CovENTRY IS Militant
9 Arctic Russian discards clothing in warmer European region (6)
IBERIA
sIBERIAn (Arctic Russian) without first and last letter or ‘discarding clothing’
10 Remain in boats heading west having dumped cargo (4)
STAY
YAchTS (boats) reversed or ‘heading west’ without middle letters or ‘dumping cargo’
11 Charge raving mad nun (the one pulled from the bog) (7,3)
TOLLUND MAN
TOLL (charge) and an anagram of MAD NUN – anagrind is ‘raving’. If you want to know more about the ‘man pulled from the bog’ click HERE.
12 Smarten up by wearing this oriental-sounding number (6)
TIEPIN
Sounds like THAI (oriental) PIN (number)
14 8 Down sailor involved in health drive needs meds regularly (8)
DIABETES
AB (sailor) in DIET (health drive) mEdS (‘regular’ letters only) – 8 down being ‘malady’
15 Established arrival time to return car (6)
ESTATE
EST (established) ETA (arrival time) reversed or ‘returning’
17 Warning for others with an encouragement towards crime? (6)
BEACON
BE A CON – an encouragement towards crime!
20 Seller of dope here in Berlin (8)
CLOTHIER
CLOT (dope) HIER (here in German)
22 Bones possibly genuine? Not a single Catholic suspects at first (6)
RELICS
REaL (genuine) without ‘a’ + I (single) + CS (initial or ‘first’ letters of Catholic Suspects)
23 Key exercise of youngster prior to climb (5,5)
MINOR SCALE
MINOR (youngster) in front of or ‘prior to’ SCALE (climb)
24/24D Coastal area across Britain has sound population growth (4,4)
BABY BOOM
BAY (coastal area) around B (Britain) + BOOM (sound)
25 Bright Liberal attends university with money (6)
LUCENT
L (Liberal) U (university) CENT (money)
26 Coat snagged in shoe when dancing for events (8)
HOEDOWNS
DOWN (coat) inside an anagram of SHOE – anagrind is ‘when dancing’
Down
1 Using cycle to ferry son is not going to work (2,6)
ON STRIKE
ON TRIKE (using cycle) around or ‘ferrying’ S (son)
2 Play about king constructing a city (4)
TROY
TOY (play) about R (King)
3 Mechanical component of weapon unfinished on centre of bench (6)
PISTON
PISTOl (weapon) missing last letter or ‘unfinished’ on N – middle letter or ‘centre’ of bench
4 Poor handling of disturbing ageism across America (8)
MISUSAGE
An anagram of AGEISM – anagrind is ‘disturbing’ – around US (America)
5 Dominant swan on cold island lake makes popular choice for artists (4,6)
LEAD PENCIL
LEAD (dominant) PEN (swan) C (cold) I (island) L (lake)
6 Last bit of nearly decent beer (6)
FINALE
FINe (decent) missing last letter or ‘nearly’ + ALE (beer)
8 Two women consecutively having illness (6)
MALADY
MA LADY (two women)
13 Prayer from teetering treetop in Italy (10)
PETITIONER
An anagram of TREETOP IN and I (Italy) – anagrind is ‘teetering’
16 Tungsten in container solidifies, forming threads (8)
TWINSETS
W (Tungsten) in TIN (container) SETS (solidifies). ‘Threads’ is another word to describe clothes.
18 Anatomical part in manic bonk scene not initially spotted (4-4)
NECK-BONE
An anagram of BONK sCENE – without ‘s’ (the ‘initial’ letter). The anagrind is ‘manic’. We had this down first of all as an anagram of BOOK CENE and wondered about OBOE NECK at one point.
19 Professor emptied every lecture (6)
PREACH
ProfessoR (first and last letters only or ’emptied’) EACH (every)
21 In bed with loyalist party after Blair is defrocked (4,2)
LAID UP
DUP (Loyalist party) after bLAIr (middle letters only or ‘defrocked’)
22 Staggered wine courses around the fish (6)
REELED
RED (wine) around EEL (fish)
24 See 24 Across
Another enjoyable teaser from wire. I also worked out TOLLUND MAN from the cryptic fodder and then looked it up.
In 18d, I take the removal of S as the removal of first letter of ‘Spotted’.
Thanks to Wire and Bertandjoyce.
Thanks to B&J for explaining a couple of things for me: dumping cargo in 10a; and the meaning of “threads” in 16d.
Thanks too to Wire for an enjoyable puzzle in which 12a was my favourite.
Wire has certainly come on in leaps and bounds since his days in BD’s Rookie Corner and I really enjoyed this one.
No problem with 11a as I became interested in such things after Lindow Pete was found less than a mile from where I lived.
Plenty of ticks on my sheet – 12&23a plus 1,5&19d to mention just a few.
Many thanks to Wire and to B&J for the blog.
A pleasant and fairly quick solve though not without a few headscratching moments. We guessed early on that the second word of 11ac would be ‘man’ but it wasn’t till we got all the crossing letters that we worked out the answer and googled to confirm it. And the 8dn/14ac connection held us up for a while. Incidentally 14dn is a bit &lit-ish in the reference to ‘needs meds regularly’.
We think the parsing of HOEDOWNS is an instruction to ‘coat’ the word ‘down’ ( = snagged in the sense of something being stopped or ‘down’ if it’s snagged) in an anagram of ‘shoe’.
Plenty to like; favourites include ON STRIKE and MINOR SCALE.
Thanks, Wire and B&J
Thanks wire
I liked MISUSAGE, FINALE and especially PREACH
Had never heard of TOLLUND MAN, needed Wikipedia to clarify
Many thanks B&J
A few lovely ones, but to me the grid was a bit surprising. By having 24A and 24D be part of the same clue, you essentially have a seven letter answer with only 2 checked squares. I’m too new at the cryptic game to know if that is kosher, but it seemed uncool. Thanks to Wire and, as always, to B&J
Enjoyable stuff, in which I too had to confirm TOLLUND MAN.
ON STRIKE was my favourite (although don’t get me started on the failways …).
Thanks to Wire and B&J.
Thanks to B&J and everyone for their comments. Tollund Man clearly not as widely known as I had thought! I had come across it in a magazine article as I was starting this puzzle, and I remembered having to do it as a project in primary school. Always helpful to have a working knowledge of Danish peat bog excavations, I find ?
That should have been a smiley at the end of that sentence…but obviously emoticons don’t work on this site! : )