It’s been nearly two years since we had the pleasure of blogging a Vigo puzzle.
We found this a very straightforward solve, which we rattled through fairly quickly, with no unusual words and no need for any electronic assistance. However… Tuesday is usually theme day and we can’t really see an obvious theme here.
Firstly we wondered if 10ac was a keyword, perhaps with 28ac, but we couldn’t find any other ‘blues’. There are however a number of entries which might partner with ‘red’ – 30ac, 3d, 6d, 29d and the first part of 20d, but is this a theme? Or are we missing something else entirely?
Yes, we were missing something. With a little nudge from a friend who thought that we didn’t watch enough “Only Connect’ we found 15 words connected to SHARK! Not all of them are listed in Chambers but we have googled them. Three of them (BITE, ATTACK and SKIN) come after SHARK and 12 in front (GOBLIN, CARPET, BULL, BLUE, LAND, REEF, LEMON, TIGER, NURSE, WHALE, MACKEREL and THRESHER).
One minor quibble – Vigo uses ‘head’ as an indicator for the first letter of a word no less than three times in this puzzle, which seems a little excessive. On the other hand, we needed a ‘heads-up!
Across
8 Induce companion to hide books one and five (8)
MOTIVATE
MATE (companion) round or ‘hiding’ OT (Old Testament – ‘books’) I (one) V (five)
9 Sparing prisoner returning after loud game (6)
FRUGAL
LAG (prisoner) reversed or ‘returning’ after F (loud) RU (Rugby Union – ‘game’)
10 Loudly blasted navy perhaps (4)
BLUE
A homophone (‘loudly’) of BLEW (blasted)
11 Seabirds not featuring in adverts (5)
PUFFS
PUFFinS (seabirds) without ‘in’
12 Oddly learned nation (4)
LAND
Odd letters of LeArNeD
13 Bombastic, defiant revolutionary crosses line (8)
INFLATED
An anagram of DEFIANT (anagrind is ‘revolutionary’) round or ‘crossing’ L (line)
16 A course of action over time becomes offensive (6)
ATTACK
A TACK (course of action) round or ‘over’ T (time)
18 Stop good woman and author returning (4)
STEM
ST (saint – ‘good woman’) + ME (author) reversed or ‘returning’
20 Tend to swear without hint of caution after noon (5)
NURSE
cURSE (swear) without the ‘c’ (first letter or ‘hint’ of ‘caution’) after N (noon)
21 Man covered in, for example, revolting type of butter (4)
GHEE
HE (man) ‘covered’ in EG (for example) reversed or ‘revolting’
22 Wry, smooth and in charge (6)
IRONIC
IRON (‘smooth’) IC (in charge)
23 Imposed target involving uniformed group (8)
ENFORCED
END (target) round or ‘involving’ FORCE (‘uniformed group’)
26 Lives with the French somewhere surrounded by water (4)
ISLE
IS (lives) LE (‘the’ in French)
28 Wide, robust creature (5)
WHALE
W (wide) HALE (robust)
30 Hide second family (4)
SKIN
S (second) KIN (family)
31 Part of eye engineers can advance (6)
RETINA
RE (Royal Engineers) TIN (can) A (advance)
32 Cram leek roughly into fish (8)
MACKEREL
An anagram of CRAM LEEK – anagrind is ‘roughly’
Down
1 Try to get almost completely sightless magical creature (6)
GOBLIN
GO (try) BLINd (sightless) without the last letter or ‘almost completely’
2 Live without sex or power (4)
BITE
BE (live) round or ‘without’ IT (sex)
3 Reprimand cat, for example, getting under vehicle (6)
CARPET
PET (‘cat, for example’) under (in a down clue) CAR (vehicle)
4 Head of restoration raised charge for endangered habitat (4)
REEF
R (first letter or ‘head’ of ‘restoration’) + FEE (charge) reversed or ‘raised’
5 Dodgy period behind the scenes (8)
OFFSTAGE
OFF (dodgy) STAGE (period)
6 Male majority almost left (4)
BULL
BULk (majority) without the last letter or ‘almost’ + L (left)
7 Cable ran broadcast showing hanger-on (8)
BARNACLE
An anagram of CABLE RAN – anagrind is ‘broadcast’
14 Compile montage featuring something defective (5)
LEMON
Hidden in (‘featuring’) compiLE MONtage
15 Set up network attracting European lament (5)
DIRGE
GRID (network) reversed or ‘set up’ + E (European)
17 Row about German beast (5)
TIGER
TIER (row) round G (German)
19 Flail about with second husband in the river (8)
THRESHER
RE (about) S (Second) H (husband) in THE R (river)
20 Engineer knew race could be a tie (8)
NECKWEAR
An anagram of KNEW RACE – anagrind is ‘engineer’
24 Vicious fellow replacing head of drill (6)
FIERCE
F (fellow) replacing the first letter or ‘head’ of pIERCE (drill)
25 Influenced by old institute being cast out (6)
EXILED
LED (influenced) after or ‘by’ EX (old) I (institute)
27 Throw out unusual item (4)
EMIT
An anagram of ITEM – anagrind is ‘unusual’
29 A room with unknown host (4)
ARMY
A RM (room) Y (unknown, in algebra)
30 Observed shark eating elongated needlefish heads (4)
SEEN
First letters or ‘heads’ of Shark Eating Elongated Needlefish
Apart from the presence of Cerberus, this puzzle was a delight from start to finish with brief, accurate cluing and lovely smooth surfaces, although I was blissfully unaware of any theme.
I didn’t know 11a could mean “adverts”.
Many thanks to Vigo and to Bertandjoyce.
A second selachian theme after Crosophile’s of ? a couple of years ago. I missed the non-aquatic variety and had to look up a few others post-solve.
Very enjoyable, with or without the theme. My favourite was the image brought to mind by the surface of 21a; it was also a welcome change to see ‘butter’ as a spread, not as a charging beastie.
Thanks to Vigo and to B&J
Forgot to go theme hunting, nor did it leap out and BITE me, but still had a WHALE of a time.
Many thanks Vigo and Bertandjoyce.
Certainly didn’t know all of the sharks but knew enough of them that the theme should have surfaced – it didn’t!
Took me a while to realise that I wasn’t looking for a word meaning ‘flail about’ in 19d and, like RD, I didn’t know the term for adverts.
Excellent stuff as always from Vigo – many thanks to her and also to Betandjoyce for the blog and the theme-spotting.
Sorry Bert – wasn’t deliberately giving you a sex change!
Very neat puzzle – many thanks Vigo!
Thanks Vigo, super-smooth clues as ever and highly entertaining.
Thanks BJ; I saw BLUE WHALE and various other beasties but failed to make the connection with sharks, doh!
For what it’s worth, barnacle is also relevant . You can see why here https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anelasma
Very enjoyable puzzle and blog. Thanks to all
Thank you to BertandJoyce for the blog and also to everyone who took the time to comment. Well done to everyone who spotted the ‘ghost theme’. It helps when setting to have a group of words I’d like to include but, since I don’t reslly signal them, you need to be an Only Connect fan to see the connection maybe. There was a ‘ghost’ in the last vigo puzzle but it remains undiscovered. Maybe I should recycle that theme…
V
Didn’t start this till late as one of us had been out all day. Thankfully, therefore, it wasn’t too taxing. Didn’t spot the theme but that didn’t spoil the enjoyment. Thanks, Vigo and B&J.