Thanks Kairos for a crossword that fits the bill. Definitions are underlined in the clues.
Across
1 Cut short promotion about game (8)
ABRIDGED : AD(short for “advertisement”;promotional material) containing(about) BRIDGE(the card game).
5 Outwardly feel compassion over dump (3-3)
FLY-TIP : The 1st and last letters of(Outwardly) “feel” + reversal of(… over) PITY(compassion).
9 Joint doctor violated (8)
DOVETAIL : Anagram of(doctor) VIOLATED.
10 Get rid of last of the pickle (6)
SCRAPE : SCRAP(to get rid of) + the last letter of(last of) “the“.
Defn: …;a difficult situation.
12 Cook or warm the fisherman’s bait? (9)
EARTHWORM : Anagram of(Cook) OR WARM THE.
13 Praise extra tax cut (5)
EXTOL : EX(abbrev. for “extra”) + “toll”(tax) minus its last letter(… cut).
14 Desire contents of sugar container? (4)
ACHE : The inner 4 letters of(contents of) “sachet”(a small sealed bag containing, possibly;?, sugar).
16 See means of identification on cigarette paper (7)
TABLOID : [ LO(to see, as in “lo and behold!”) + ID(a means of identification) ] placed after(on) TAB(Scot and Northern English dialect for “cigarette”).
Defn: Newspaper whose pages are about half the standard size paper’s pages.
19 Open one’s mouth (7)
UNSTRAP : ‘UN(dialect for “one”;a person)‘S + TRAP(slang for one’s mouth).
Defn: …;to untie.
21 River follows westward pasture (4)
FEED : Reversal of(… westward, in an across clue) [ DEE(any of a number of rivers in England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland and Australia) + F(abbrev. for “follows”) ].
Defn: Grass or other plants for livestock’s consumption.
24 Sets off for travels (5)
TRIPS : Double defn: 1st: Sets off;activates a device, say, an explosive one.
25 Promise quiet entertaining Cambridge University author (9)
WORDSMITH : WORD(one’s promise) + SH!(an interjection to urge one to be quiet) containing(entertaining) MIT(abbrev. for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA).
27 Artist holds bible in court in Ascot? (6)
CRAVAT : [ RA(post-nominal letters for a member of the Royal Academy of Arts, an artist) containing(holds) AV(abbrev. for “Authorised Version” of the bible, aka the King James Version) ] contained in(in) CT(abbrev. for “court”).
28 Suffering leak in experiment (5,3)
TRIAL RUN : TRIAL(a suffering;an ordeal) + RUN(to flow or cause to flow;to leak).
29 Searches for cleaners (6)
SWEEPS : Double defn: 1st: Combs through an area for something; and 2nd: … of chimneys.
30 Make light of Penny leaving to get floor covering (8)
UNDERLAY : “underplay”(to make light of;to represent something as less important than it really is) minus(… leaving) “p”(abbrev. for “penny”, the UK currency unit).
Down
1 Lady scratching bottom attracted prince (6)
ANDREW : “Andrews”(Dame Julie, a famous English lady) minus its last letter(scratching bottom).
Defn: Specifically, the Duke of York, the second son of Queen Elizabeth the Second.
2 Turn back on green (6)
REVERT : RE(on;with reference to) + VERT(green as a heraldic colour).
Defn: … to what was before.
3 Abandon one leaving for upper-class wife (5)
DUTCH : “ditch”(to abandon, say, a project) with “I”(Roman numeral for “one”) replaced by(leaving for) “U”(indicating “upper-class”).
Defn: …, in Cockney rhyming slang.
4 Abstract example (7)
EPITOME : Double defn: 1st: A summary of a written work; and 2nd: … of a particular type or quality.
6 Presumably second storage facility that is for Scottish town (9)
LOCKERBIE : [LOCKER B](cryptically;presumably, the second storage facility after Locker A, the 1st, and before Locker C, the 3rd) + IE(abbrev. for “id est”;that is).
7 Pamphlet – one about medical procedure (8)
TRACTION : TRACT(pamphlet, especially of a religious sort) + I(Roman numeral for “one”) + ON(about, as in “the talk was on ….”).
8 Rule out contralto appearing in first movement (8)
PRECLUDE : C(abbrev. for “contralto”) contained in(appearing in) PRELUDE(the first movement;introductory piece of music to an opera act or music suite)
11 Issue of Time to support old record company (4)
EMIT : T(abbrev. for “time”) placed below(to support, in a down clue) EMI(a now defunct British music record company).
15 Discards harpoon held by cheat – quite the reverse (4,5)
CARD SHARP : Hidden in(held by … – quite the reverse) “Discards harpoon“.
17 Behind objection to tips in clinical knowledge summaries (8)
BUTTOCKS : BUT(an objection, as in “no ifs and buts”) + TO + the 1st letters, respectively, of(tips in) “clinical knowledge summaries“.
18 Parisian is international friend to value (8)
ESTIMATE : EST(the Parisian/French word for “is”) + I(abbrev. for “international”) + MATE(friend).
20 Reportedly break feet (4)
PAWS : Homophone of(Reportedly) “pause”(a break in proceedings).
21 Knox, for example, organised computer language (7)
FORTRAN : FORT(an example of which is Knox, the US Army post famous for being the site of the US Bullion Depository) + RAN(organised;managed).
22 Lovelessly leave out examination of a heart valve (6)
MITRAL : [“omit”(to leave out) + “oral”(a spoken examination) ] minus from each word(…lessly) “o”(letter denoting 0;love in tennis scores).
23 Substantial dish in Cyprus (6)
CHUNKY : HUNK(a large strong sexually attractive man;a dish as he may be called) contained in(in) CY(International Vehicle Registration code for Cyprus).
26 Make a zig-zag movement to capture king for rook (5)
SNAKE : “snare”(to capture;to trap) with “K”(abbrev. for “king” in chess notation) replacing(for) “R”(abbrev. for “rook” in chess notation).
I found this a bit tougher than usual. I didn’t know the first definition of EPITOME, or the slang meaning of DUTCH.
I liked LOCKERBIE, once I finally twigged.
I parsed 1dn as AN(n) (lady scratching bottom) + DREW (attracted).
Thanks Kairos and scchua.
I parsed 1d as Swatty. Couldn’t parse UNSTRAP, so thanks for that scchua. This was a real Goldilocks puzzle for me. Got stuck several times but then had a flash of inspiration and managed to carry on. Not the kindest of grids – each quadrant barely linked to the others with the NE the last to fall. For awhile, I wondered if there was a place in Scotland called Larderbie, but getting SCRAPE led to the well-known town. Lots of clues were cleverly misleading and I can’t really list favourites since there were so many. Best fun I’ve had in ages (maybe I should get out more). Thanks to all.
Everything I would expect from this excellent setter – something of a battle but hugely rewarding.
A couple of awkward moments over the IT stuff in 21d and the 22d heart valve but otherwise just a question of getting the right train of thought.
Too many ‘favourites’ to list although the Cypriot dish made me smile the most!
Many thanks to Kairos and to sschua for a most comprehensible blog.
Great stuff which I much enjoyed but did manage to make quite a meal of.
I didn’t know the first meaning of 4d but was drawn to it by thinking of epi-tome, and used the dictionary to confirm. 22d was also new, though unproblematic, and Mr K supplied the correct parsing of 14a for me.
I was also in the swatty/Hovis camp with 1d.
As for Jane, my biggest smile was at 23d so that earns the KitKat.
Many thanks to Kairos and scchua.
Many thanks Kairos
This took longer than usual. I missed card sharp, argh, foxed by the quite the reverse focus sing too much on just harpoon. Also missed ache (which might have given me card sharp). Many thanks scchua for the illumination
Liked cravat, Andrew, buttocks, estimate, chunky & more.
Great puzzle
Failed on 21ac having thought ‘westward’ applied just to ‘pasture’ and tried to convince myself that the must be a River Fael somewhere. Otherwise all very straightforward, although it took me a while to get FLY-TIP and ACHE, and to pinpoint the location of Cambridge in 25ac. CoD for me was the aforementioned ACHE.
Thanks, Kairos and scchua
Haha – I will admit to looking up River Fael too!
A real struggle for me, though eventually all in correctly after the River Fael was finally put out to pasture – glad I was in good company anyway. Not really on song and took ages to spot eg CARD SHARP and LOCKERBIE (should have seen this straight away as I was in the U.K. in 1988) but a satisfying and enjoyable solve which was worth a bit of frustration along the way.
Thank you to Kairos and scchua
Enjoyable, but tough. For me it was a crossie that looked easy, but proved anything but with a mixture of excellent deception (count me as another who helped the fabled river Fael get to the top of today’s most searched Google terms) and those clues where you can see what you’re meant to do, but the right synonyms won’t come to mind. Honours today go to the very simple, but very effective deception so thanks to Kairos for a nice puzzle and to scchua for the blog.
A very nice puzzle, indeed.
But where can I find F = ‘follows’?
Shouldn’t it be ‘following’?
Sil @10 – I see the SOED has ‘following etc’ for F in the abbreviation section, but not sure whether that ‘etc’ covers ‘follows’ as well. Seeing as our setter is both a man of law and a man of religion, could be a legal or religious thing, or perhaps it’s just a very rare blip and proof that even Kairos nods.
Ah yes, forgot to say I also had FAEL, intending to look it up then forgot. Glad I’m not alone.
I’m sorry but you can’t just make up your own abbreviations!!
F = FOLLOWS?? Why?? Because it fits??
Goodish puzzle marred by atrocious clue.
A very late comment from me as I was with family and couldn’t print it off. (I still cannot solve crosswords onlne!) I enjoyed this very much, but I did have a bit of a tussle in the SE corner. There was so much to like I shan’t list any faves.
With many thanks to Kairos, and the same to Scchua for untangling the problems I had.