Financial Times 16,318 by NEO

by

A challenger from Neo in today's FT

I took a while to get started with this puzzle, but the long perimeter solutions helped, at least in so far as it allowied me to fill in some of the other answers without always immediately seeing how the clue worked. For example, it took a while to see the parsing of RHINE and PHENOMENA and I still can't parse NIGER, but I'm sure someone will help me with that.

Thanks, Neo.

ACROSS
1 FROM HAND TO MOUTH Improvident way to eat (4,4,2,5)
 

One way of eating if there were no utensils nearby would be to eat from your hand (to your mouth).

9 LEADING Principal drug hidden among cargo (7)
 

E (ecstasy, so "drug") hidden among LADING ("cargo")
10 SULTANA Royal is sweet little thing (7)
 

Double definition
11 OMITS Drops moist pants (5)
 

*(moist) [anag: pants]
12 REFURBISH Do up shortened red coat by mistake (9)
 

[shortened] RE(d) + FUR ("coat") by BISH ("mistake")
13 HONEY BEAR Two similar animals to Spooner, and another (5,4)
 

Spooner may have said BUNNY HARE ("two similar animals") instead of HONEY BEAR
15 ROMEO This lover and his partner both characters on the radio (5)
 

Cryptic definition – both Romeo and his lover Juliet represent letters in the phonetic alphabet (R and J respectively)
16 RHINE River runs within explosive borders (5)
 

R (runs) + IN ("within") bordered by HE ((High) Explosive)
18 PHENOMENA Flower power on reflection stopped by hard facts (9)
 

<= (ANEMONE ("flower") + P (power)) [on reflection] stopped by H (hard)
20 TEMPTRESS Siren time and time again interrupting tsarina? (9)
 

T (time) + T (time, again) interrupting EMPRESS ("tsarina")
23 CHEER Companion always gives comfort (5)
 

CH (Companion (of Honour)) + E'ER ("always")
24 MARTINI Swallow one alcoholic drink (7)
 

MARTIN ("swallow") + I (one)
25 LENTIGO Skin condition has spread into leg (7)
 

*(into leg) [anag: spread]
26 SILVER MEDALLIST Prize-winner still made to dance by pirate (6,9)
 

*(still made) [anag: to dance] by (Long John) SILVER ("pirate")
DOWN
1 FALL ON HARD TIMES Devour Dickensian work and get into debt (4,2,4,5)
 

FALL ON ("devour") + HARD TIMES ("Dickensian work")
2 ORATION Getting zero on dole warrants speech (7)
 

O (nothing) on RATION ("dole")
3 HAIRSTYLE One in Harley Street shortened hideous cut (9)
 

I (one) in *(harley st) [anag: hideous] (where ST is "street" shortened)
4 NIGER Not complete setback for Queen and Country (5)
 

Sorry, the parsing for this has escaped me. ER or R for Queen, but the rest of it?
5 TASK FORCE Tories initially request church to create special unit (4,5)
 

T(ories) [initially] ASK FOR ("request") + CE (Church (of England))
6 MOLAR Back biter? (5)
 

Cryptic definition
7 URANIUM Element in uniform with skull cap removed? (7)
 

U (uniform) with (c)RANIUM ("skull" cap (i.e capital) removed)
8 HEATHROW AIRPORT What horror! Pie thrown around at London hub! (8,7)
 

*(what horror pie) [anag: thrown] around AT
14 EUPHEMISM One’s left us for dead (9)
 

LEFT US is a euphemism for DEAD
15 ROOT CANAL Oral passage in cartoon stimulated a Liberal (4,5)
 

*(cartoon) [anag: stimulated] + A L (Liberal)
17 IMMORAL Bad mark repeatedly given in current exam (7)
 

M + M (mark, repeatedly) in I (symbol for electric "current" in physics) + ORAL ("exam")
19 EMERITI Boundless audacity beginning to irritate old academics (7)
 

[boundless] (t)EMERIT(y) ("audacity") + [beginning to] I(irritate)
21 TRIPE Junk food (5)
 

Double definition
22 SOLID Fluid occasionally seen in ground that’s like rock? (5)
 

(f)L(u)I(d) [occasionally] seen in SOD ("ground")

11 comments on “Financial Times 16,318 by NEO”

  2. Parsed NIGER as Hornbeam. Struggled with this but got there without any cheats. Nearly gave in to a word fit to get PHENOMENA but spotted it at the last moment. This then gave me EUPHEMISM as my LOI.

    Thanks to Neo and loonapick.

  3. Another splendid crossword from Neo.   A very nice crossword setter (not Neo – although he is of course another nice crossword setter) once told me that the way to remember how to spell the flower in 18a was to remember that it was the last seven letters of phenomena backwards.

    Thanks to Neo and loonapick

  4. Thanks to Neo and loonapick. Very enjoyable. I did not parse NIGER but liked EUPHEMISM once I got it and EMERITI  (I’m one of them)..

  5. My first run through the clues was disheartening but I managed to get most of them eventually; I did “cheat” to get PHENOMENA and wished I had seen the brilliant parsing. Thanks Neo — solid as ever — and Loonapick for clarifying.

  6. A typically good and satisfying Neo puzzle in which 14d’s EUPHEMISM was actually quite brilliant. Perhaps simple – but brilliant.

    Thanks to Loonapick for the blog & to Neo for the fun.

  9. Thanks Neo and loonapick

    Typically entertaining puzzle from this setter which was completed slightly under my average time for an FT crossword.  Helped early on by getting the long clues at 1a / 1d and then the other two not all that long after.  Still missed the parsing for NIGER as well (concerning when I saw Hornbeam’s parsing – and realised that I’d seen that word similarly clued previously).  Also didn’t see the brilliance of the EUPHEMISM until coming here.

    LENTIGO was a new term which needed to be checked after unraveling the anagram fodder to the most logical pattern.

    Finished in the SW corner with that EUPHEMISM and TEMPTRESS (after finally seeing the right ‘siren’).

Comments are closed.