Financial Times 16,974 by FALCON

Solid fare from the Falcon this morning.

Not far off a write-in, a brisk December morning's romp of a puzzle. Thanks and a merry Christmas to Falcon and to posters and lurkers everywhere.

 picture of the completed grid

ACROSS
1 NOTEPAD
Pay close attention to stuff in jotter (7)

NOTE ('pay close attention') + PAD ('to stuff'). Actually, that 'TO' could be legitimately read in 3 ways, if you think about it.

5 PICASSO
Artist’s photographs must include American because of that (7)

PIC.S ('photographs') include A[merican], then SO ('because of that').

9 LUPIN
Short row involving winning flower (5)

L.INe ('row'), shortened, includes UP ('winning').

10 VOLTE-FACE
Turning round, left a cove in resort (5-4)

Anagram ('re-sort') of LEFT A COVE.

11 SMELL A RAT
Suspect something’s amiss, with master criminal holding everyone back (5,1,3)

Anagram ('criminal') of MASTER contains reversal of ALL.

12 NIGHT
Near end of flight in darkness (5)

NIGH ('near') + last of 'flighT'.

13 CRIME OF PASSION
Film noir: mafiosos and prince involved (5,2,7)

Anagram ('involved') of MAFIOSOS, PRINCE..

18 EXTENDED FAMILY
Tribe nervously feed lynx I tamed (8,6)

Anagram ('nervously') of LYNX I TAMED.

20 LOCUS
Spot insect shedding tail (5)

LOCUSt.

22 GLADIATOR
Fierce debater’s happy I returned list (9)

GLAD + I + reversal of ROTA.

24 NURSEMAID
Remind us, subtly, about a nanny (9)

Anagram ('subtly') of REMIND US surrounds 'A'.

25 LEAVE
Take off most of foliage (5)

LEAVEs.

26 RELAYED
Backing Ivy League university during revolutionary broadcast (7)

Reversal of YALE in R.ED ('revolutionary').

27 RETREAT
Withdraw in place of refuge (7)

Double definition.

DOWN
1 NO LESS
Number reduced, would you believe? (2,4)

NO ('number') + LESS ('reduced').

2 TOP-SECRET
Street cop redeployed? That could be classified (3-6)

Anagram ('redeployed') of STREET COP.

3 PENAL
Extremely severe correspondent, disregarding second page (5)

PEN-pAL ('correspondent') without 2nd P[age].

4 DOVER SOLE
Fish? Only after daughter left (5,4)

D[aughter] + OVER ('left') + SOLE ('only').

5 PILOT
Guide, one in main story (5)

1 in P.LOT

6 CHEONGSAM
G-man chose fancy dress (9)

Anagram ('fancy') of G MAN CHOSE, for the oriental side-splitter.

7 SLANG
Colloquialisms in various languages (5)

Hidden in 'variouS LANGuages'.

8 OVERTONE
Connotation may be obvious, one added (8)

OVERT ('obvious') + ONE.

14 MONASTERY
Religious community, one briefly in control (9)

M.ASTERY ('control') includes ONe, shortened.

15 PUFF ADDER
Snake tot’s seen inside steam engine (4,5)

ADD (to 'tot') in PUFF.ER ('steam engine').

16 ILL AT EASE
Dicky, a guy far from relaxed (3,2,4)

ILL ('dicky') + A + TEASE (to 'guy').

17 RECLINER
What’s on top of cruise ship’s comfy chair? (8)

RE (about, concerning, 'on') + 1st of C{ruise} + LINER ('ship').

19 PRIEST
Bother about religious instruction? It’s my job to! (6)

P.EST (a 'bother') surrounds RI, &lit.

21 CAROL
Song about a character lacking energy (5)

C[irca] ('about') + A + ROLe ('character') without E[nergy].

22 GRAND
Superb piano (5)

Double def.

23 INLET
Home leased in cove (5)

IN ('home') + LET ('leased').

11 comments on “Financial Times 16,974 by FALCON”

  1. Thanks for the blog, neat and tidy clues here I liked ILL AT EASE, shades of Nixon, PENAL was very good and precise with the SECOND page.
    ( Minor typo, you forgot to feed the lynx for 18AC)

  2. Enjoyed this outing from Falcon with PUFF ADDER being my favourite. The long anagrams were fun too.
    Nothing too taxing but didn’t parse CAROL.
    Thanks to Falcon for a gentle stroll and to Grant.

  3. I thought PRIEST was a great clue and others such as RECLINER and PICASSO rewarded the effort in working out the parsing. The ‘Extremely severe’ sense of PENAL was new to me and I liked the reminder of the old “penpal” in this age of social media and email etc.

    I’m not familiar with CRIME OF PASSION; sounds as if it may be worth a look.

    Thanks to Falcon and Grant

  4. A huge relief to have a straightforward puzzle after the serious challenges of recent issues.Some neat clues. Thanks to both for starting the holiday week in an orderly manner while chaos swirls around us.

  5. Thanks Falcon for well-written clues that actually made some sense. Favourites inclued SMELL A RAT, EXTENDED FAMILY, and DOVER SOLE. Thanks Grant for the blog. Like Diane I had difficulty parsing CAROL.

  6. ‘Solid fare’ and ‘not far off a write-in’ – quite an achievement to get the perfect balance between those two. So chapeau to Falcon.
    And thanks, too, to Grant.

  7. Donna @ 7 Crime Of Passion is the title of a 1950s American film which both IMDB and wikipedia classify in the noir genre.

  8. Most enjoyable. Next time I’m in Asia I must keep an eye out for a passing cheongsam. 13a was a little before my time.

  9. Geoff,
    You’ll be happy to learn that cheongsams are having a moment again in Hong Kong. They’d largely slipped out of use other than in hotel restaurants, summer school uniforms or worn by matrons at formal occasions. It seems Gen Z women are re-embracing their cultural heritage for IG- ready pics beside old temples and the like.

  10. Thanks Falcon and Grant
    First contract that I’ve had in a while that required work up until Christmas Eve in a program with a lot of work to do. So didn’t get to complete this in bits and bats until Wednesday and slipped checking it off until now. Found it a little harder than a write in, taking my average time to solve. Also missed the proper parsing of CAROL – had somewhat lazily assumed CAROLE was loosely defined as a ‘character’ then subtracted the E from that.
    Not heard of the erotic film noir at 13, but did know of the CHEONGSAM from when my ex-wife used to wear one to formal events (not sure Diane, whether she would have reacted kindly to being called a ‘matron’ at the time 🙂 ).
    Finished in the NE corner with PICASSO (slow on the uptake to work him out), OVERTONE and that CRIME OF PASSION as the last one in.

Comments are closed.