The puzzle may be found at https://observer.co.uk/puzzles/everyman/article/everyman-no-4123 in interactive form, or https://cdn.slowdownwiseup.co.uk/media/documents/obs.everyman.20251026.pdf as a PDF.
All present and correct, with some neat if straightforward constructions.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | BEAR HUGS |
Embraces giving you headlice, according to Spooner (4,4)
|
| HAIR BUGS (‘headlice’).. | ||
| 5 | WARBLE |
Sing happily as blue uniform’s ditched following combat (6)
|
| A charade of WAR (‘combat’) plus ‘bl[u]e minus the U (‘uniform’s ditched’). | ||
| 9 | AGNUS DEI |
Prayer that’s sung, unfortunately – bad idea all round (5,3)
|
| An envelope (‘all round’) of GNUS, an anagram (‘unfortunately’) of ‘sung’ in ADEI, an anagram (‘bad’) of ‘idea’. | ||
| 10 | BIGOTS |
Reactionaries: large (outsize); internally tense (6)
|
| A charade of BIG (‘large’) plus OTS, an envelope, no less, (‘internally’) of T (‘tense’) in OS (‘outsize’). | ||
| 12 | YANKEE-DOODLE |
Fancifully, one’s drawn scribble portraying American icon (6-6)
|
| A charade of YANKEE, a whimsical formation (‘fancifully’) for a person yanked (‘one’s drawn’); plus DOODLE (‘scribble’). | ||
| 15 | CURLY FRIES |
Questionable furry slice as may be served with burger (5,5)
|
| An anagram (‘quesrionable’) of ‘furry slice’. | ||
| 17 | BALL |
Dance and sob audibly (4)
|
| Sounds like (‘audibly’) BAWL (‘sob’). | ||
| 19 | ARCH |
Knowing what may mark a triumph (4)
|
| Double definition. | ||
| 20 | SCRAP METAL |
Recalled former MP (Bow) beginning to sing Any Old Iron (5,5)
|
| A reversal (‘recalled’) of LATE (‘former’) plus ‘MP’ plus ARC (‘bow’) plus S (‘beginning to Sing’).. | ||
| 21 | FRENCH POODLE |
Preposterously: Force getting no help with dog, principally a dainty one (6,6)
|
| An anagram (‘preposterously’) of ‘force’ plus ‘no help’ plus D (‘Dog principally’), with ‘one’ referring back to ‘dog’. | ||
| 26 | OUTFIT |
Firm clothing (6)
|
| Double definition, the first being a term for a business. | ||
| 27 | HIJACKER |
Greeting sailor with hesitant expression: perhaps a pirate? (8)
|
| A charade of HI (‘greeting’) plus JACK (‘sailor’) plus ER (‘hesitant expression’). | ||
| 28 | TIDIER |
In better order, more like 13? (6)
|
| A whimsical coinage, with 13D OCEAN FRONT being subject to tides. | ||
| 29 | ONE-SIDED |
Being pretentious, Everyman’s identified as unbalanced (3-5)
|
| A charade of ONE’S (‘being pretentious, Everyman’s) plus ID’ED (‘identified’). | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | BEAU |
Boy essaying amorous undertakings, primarily? (4)
|
| First letters (‘primarily’) of ‘Boy Essaying Amorous Undertakings’, &lit. | ||
| 2 | ACNE |
What teenagers are loth be seen spotted in? (4)
|
| Cryptic definition. | ||
| 3 | HUSH-A-BYE |
Yeah! Bush composed lullaby (4-1-3)
|
| An anagram (‘composed’) of ‘yeah bush’. | ||
| 4 | GREEK |
Like some salad? I’m angry – not quite; I’m alarmed (5)
|
| A charade of GR[r] (‘I’m angry’) minus its last letter (‘not quite’) plus EEK! (‘I’m alarmed’). | ||
| 6 | AMIGO |
Lammy is goof at regular intervals, pal (5)
|
| Alternate letters (‘at regular intervals’) of ‘lAmMy Is GoOf’ | ||
| 7 | BROADCASTS |
Fat collections of actors in TV shows (10)
|
| A charade of BROAD (‘fat’) plus CASTS (‘collections of actors’). | ||
| 8 | EASTER LILY |
Bloomer as 51 overwhelmed by wind (6,4)
|
| An envelope (‘overwhelmed by’) of LI (Roman numeral, ’51’) in EASTERLY (‘wind’). | ||
| 11 | GENEVA |
Info on electric vehicle’s acceleration in European city (6)
|
| A charade of GEN (‘info’) plus EV (‘electrical vehicle’) plus A (‘acceleration’). | ||
| 13 | OCEAN-FRONT |
None factor in disarray where waves break onto the shore (5-5)
|
| An anagram (‘in disarray’) of ‘none factor’. To me, the hyphen suggests an adjective, whereas the definition is nounal. | ||
| 14 | PROCREATED |
Started a family, as seen in ghastly tape-record (10)
|
| An anagram (‘ghastly’) of ‘tape-record’. | ||
| 16 | RECIPE |
Orders for chef that is leaving flipping épicerie (6)
|
| A reversal (‘flipping’) of ‘epicer[ie]’ minus I.E. (‘that is’). | ||
| 18 | SMALL ADS |
Newspaper feature showing a duke enthralled by underwear (5,3)
|
| An envelope (‘enthralled by’) of ‘a’ plus D (‘duke’) in SMALLS (‘underwear’). | ||
| 22 | CHIME |
Measure of Archimedes: ring a bell? (5)
|
| A hidden answer (‘measure of’) in ‘ArCHIMEdes’. | ||
| 23 | ORION |
Looking up: black ring that shines in the sky (5)
|
| A reversal (‘looking up’ in a down light) of NOIR (‘black’) plus O (‘ring’). | ||
| 24 | SKID |
Small child to lose grip (4)
|
| A charade of S (‘small’) plus KID (‘child’). | ||
| 25 | BRAD |
Pitt the Elder’s last character to be overcome by evil? (4)
|
| An envelope (‘to be overcome by’) of R (‘the eldeR‘s last character’) in BAD (‘evil’). |
Thanks PeterO. My experience was mixed, and not always ”straightforward”, perhaps because I was overthinking some and underthinking others, and missing some GK. Never heard of CURLY FRIES.
I initially tripped up on the wordplay for ORION, not looking for the French noir, although I’m sure it’s been sufficiently assimilated into English for it not to be indicated as French. ORION is very visible in our night sky.
Funny now, in hindsight. My first stab at the clue for ARCH, was ”nous”, as a noun. Knowing what may mark a triumph. NO US!
I did know the old song Any Old Iron and watched Steptoe and Son in my younger days, so SCRAP METAL was okay. As it turns out I didn’t need to know lammy in AMIGO.
CHIME, BRAD and WARBLE were clever.
{It’s a bit sad now that Everyman is back on the Observer that we have fewer comments here. I miss Roz. I wonder if newer Everyman solvers on the Observer even know about 15 sq)
Interesting that you see ORION, paddymelon. I thought it was a particularly northern sky constellation.
Good puzzle, I thought. Thanks PeterO.
I finished this but could not always parse. So, thank you for the explanations. My problems were ORION and SCRAP METAL (both reversals) and YANKEE. BRAD was my last one in and a good misdirection after PITT THE ELDER was also in last week’s puzzle.
Christopher
#paddymelon – I love 15 squared as a “not so newbie” to cryptic crosswords, but still very much a beginner, for the explanations. I may have reached the answer but did not grasp the parsing of the clue. The lack of comments may reflect nervousness on expressing our opinion on the puzzle.
Nothing was more joyous than a reply to a contributor who found the puzzle simple than to xxxxxxxx off as it was entry level puzzle.
Liked BEAR HUGS, TIDIER, GREEK, BROADCASTS and CHIME.
Thanks Everyman and PeterO.
Thought this was a lot harder than your average Everyman.
Enjoyed EASTER LILY…..was doubtful about OCEAN FRONT…never heard of that expression!
Thanks!
It felt challenging enough; my LOI was EASTER LILY. The rhyme helped. I liked BRAD (a smart follow-up on the previous puzzle), HIJACKER, AGNUS DEI. Needed the blog for the parsing of GREEK (completely blank) and ONESIDED – still unsure why “one’s” is pretentious… Thanks Everyman and PeterO!
PS why is PROCREATED highlighted?
Very difficult – first one in was 1d. Took longer than usual to solve this puzzle.
New for me: CURLY FRIES. Went down an AI rabbit hole trying to work out if CURRY FLIES exist!
Liked this very much, with BEAR HUGS being the favourite.
@PeterO Never tried a new Everyman on anything else, but they lack visual clues for word delimiters in the grid on my phone, and all delimiters in the text are just commas. So both HUSH-A-BYE and OCEAN FRONT are actually clued in the same way – (4,1,3) and (5,5), respectively – and I agree that the latter is meant to be a noun.
Thank you, Everyman and PeterO
I enjoyed this and would have finished it sooner if I hadn’t lazily put in ‘lop-sided’ instead of ONE-SIDED. For Everyman to speak of ‘one’s’ where most of us would say ‘my’ would indeed be pretentious.
LOI, GREEK, became my instant favourite. I always pretty much knew what the answer would be, even from just the first crosser, but I refused to put it in until my light bulb/tea tray moment with its belated-to-me parsing. Thanks aplenty to both setter and blogger.
Layman @9
I highlighted 14D PROCREATED as a one-word (well, hyphenated in this case) to one-word anagram. Not an exclusive Everyman feature, but he does come up with them quite often.
I didn’t parse the Yankee part of 12ac. I thought it might have been fanciful bet related. Good to have this resource here to put me right.
Managed most of this but needed help with parsing. Never heard of curly fries so like a Michelle@10 was trying to find another word with curry for 15a. Also didn’t know term ocean front
Pleased to have got 1a as I usually struggle with Spoonerisms.
I read every week, and often go “I see” as I’m reading. Given the comments about comments, I thought I’d join in.
It took me a while to get on Everyman’s wavelength this week. I find that when I think it’s a breeze to solve, the blog is filled with complaints about how difficult it is, and vice versa. This week was a bit of both. I felt very smug working out Agnus Dei, although it took me a while to stop thinking ‘Angus’. No, really! Things weren’t helped when I filled in 20 across with the answer to 13 down. I blame my medication – and the elevated noise level in the cafe.
Thanks to Everyman, and PeterO
A
25D LOI Sussed the parsing of BRAD & then wondered whether Pitt was a type of nail before the Hollywood penny dropped
muffin@3. ORION appears in our summer, only up-side down, of course. 🙂
#Mr Womble
Thank you. That has been driving me MAD all day. I solved it, but couldn’t see why. I’ve spent over eight hours straining my brain cell. Much appreciated.
A
@paddymelon 2. I miss Roz…always so incredibly encouraging for new solvers….amongst whom I count myself still. Really hope 15 sq. is out there for everyone…I fell on it by (lucky) chance…thanks all
RE: 17a, I mistakenly went for WAIL, thinking of the clue as a dd, and the dance being something to do with the Louis Prima song ‘Jump, Jive an’ Wail’.
Found this puzzle extremely difficult. Had to make heavy use of wldcard dictionaries, and even then struggled. Lots of clues didn’t quite work or were too obscure. Could not parse several answers.
The parsing of “yankee doodle” is pitiful.
Never heard of the term “small ads”.
Report card: Could do better.
This was okay, no stand outs but no duds either. Didn’t parse them all but that’s not unusual. Didn’t we have Pitt the Elder for Triplet recently?
I thought this one was easier than most, different strokes for different blokes I suppose!
Thanks Peter O and whichever Everyman was responsible.
A nice one but I had SLID at 24d so 27a was impossible. Got Orion but only from o***n.
I liked CURLY FRIES & FRENCH POODLE & YANKEE DOODLE.
@jayuu I think ocean-front is most often used as an adjective by real estate agents to describe the location of a house. C/f river-front and harbour-front. They further describe houses which are on the waterfront.