Just returned from work related travel so had to do the blog hurriedly. Thanks Redshank for a good workout. And to Geoff, for helping with getting this across the finish line.
FF: 9 DD:9
| Across | ||
| 1 | DEMARCHE | Demo blocks current diplomatic move (8) |
| MARCH (demo) in DEE (current) | ||
| 6 | CLEAVE | Quit following Conservative split (6) |
| C (conservative) LEAVE (quit) | ||
| 9 | DESIRE | Fancy one in house briefly, as marketed? (6) |
| I (one) in DESREs (house briefly, as marketed – short for desirable residence) | ||
| 10 | ENSCONCE | Settle down during children’s concert (8) |
| hidden in “..childrEN”SC CONCErt” | ||
| 11 | SAKI | Slide down mountains, skirting a Munro (4) |
| SKI (slide down mountains) around A – h.h.munro | ||
| 12 | INTERWEAVE | Winter doesn’t begin with eastern hail and wind together (10) |
| wINTER (doesnt begin) W (with) E (eastern) AVE (hail) | ||
| 14 | MATA HARI | Spy husband in Paris securing a revolutionary role (4,4) |
| MARI (husband in Paris) around (securing) A HAT (role) reversed (revolutionary) | ||
| 16 | EIRE | Country’s pedigree showing through here and there (4) |
| pEdIgReE (alternate letters, here and there) | ||
| 18 | ECHO | It precedes foxtrot in some choreography (4) |
| hidden in ” somE CHOreography”, phonetic alphabet e (preceding f – foxtrot) | ||
| 19 | BARBICAN | Arts centre’s Caribbean display lacking energy (8) |
| CARIBBeAN* (without E – energy) | ||
| 21 | WHEELCHAIR | What’s needed mostly when Charlie’s disabled (10) |
| &lit; WHEn (mostly) CHARLIE* | ||
| 22 | GOSH | Leave pipe down by George (4) |
| GO (leave) SH (pipe down) | ||
| 24 | FLAPJACK | Fly the flag? That’s something to get one’s teeth into (8) |
| FLAP (fly) JACK (flag) | ||
| 26 | ENTOMB | Part of hospital associated with old doctor in Bury (6) |
| ENT (part of hospital) O (old) MB (doctor) | ||
| 27 | SCORER | He scrapes 20 runs (6) |
| SCORE (20) R (runs) | ||
| 28 | TUTORIAL | Class worked out test cases (8) |
| OUT* in TRIAL (test) | ||
| Down | ||
| 2 | ENEMA | Crew picked up during each evacuation (5) |
| reverse of MEN (crew) in EA (each) | ||
| 3 | A PIG IN A POKE |
Aga pipe OK in stove? It’s a risky buy (1,3,2,1,4) |
| an anagram (stove) of AGA PIPE OK IN | ||
| 4 | CHEMICAL | Man replaces hole in funny compound? (8) |
| HE (man) replacing O (hole) in CoMICAL (funny) | ||
| 5 | ELECTRIC BLANKET | Playing netball and cricket keeps English warmer (8,7) |
| NETBALL CRICKET* containing E (english) | ||
| 6 | CASTRO | Crude suppliers finish off old red lead? (6) |
| CASTROl (crude suppliers, without last letter) | ||
| 7 | EGO | Barring odd features, Google lifts self-esteem (3) |
| reverse of gOoGlE (without odd characters) | ||
| 8 | VICE VERSA | Six clubs always like climbing round the other way (4,5) |
| VI (six) C (clubs) EVER (always) SA (like = AS, reversed) | ||
| 13 | EVENING STAR | Left paper’s late edition? Sailors may follow it (7,4) |
| double def | ||
| 15 | ALCOHOLIC | Busy local I chose predominantly to feed my habit? (9) |
| &lit; LOCAL I CHOse (predominantly)* | ||
| 17 | PRURIENT | Firm that covers nothing in France that’s ultimately erotic (8) |
| PRU (firm) RIEN (nothing in France) [tha]T (that’s ultimately) | ||
| 20 | ECLAIR | Cereal coats a large upside- down cake (6) |
| RICE (cereal) covering [ A L (large) ], all reversed | ||
| 23 | SAMOA | A month in South America and Pacific islands (5) |
| [ A MO (month) ] in SA (south america) | ||
| 25 | PAR | Normal item first person picked out (3) |
| PAiR (item, without I – first person) | ||
*anagram
He keeps providing good puzzles, whatever name he uses.Thanks er Redshank and the very hardworking Turbolegs!
Yes, we’ve had three treats this week!
I really liked ELECTRIC BLANKET, WHEELCHAIR and ALCOHOLIC and the ‘hail and wind together’ in 12ac. And the neat little 22ac.
Many thanks to Turbolegs and Redshanks.
Thanks to Redshank and Turbolegs . Great fun. DESIRE was my LOI and a guess (DESRE was new to me here in the US) and I took a long time parsing MATA HARI and EIRE.
I could almost have copied Eileen’s post.
Same favourites, 5d being a fantastic anagram clue and the other two (21ac, 15d) just as brilliant. Not &lits, though.
The misunderstanding about an &lit is probably that some (many?) solvers think that it is one when the (non-cd) clue as a whole is the definition.
That is not enough! Every word in the clue should be part of the wordplay which is not the case here. That said, 21ac’s WEELCHAIR comes close and might perhaps be qualified as a semi-&lit.
Many thanks to Turbolegs & Redshank.
I had ‘revanche” for 1ac but couldn’t parse it – of course. “ Desres” was new to me.
Thanks both
Thanks Redshank and Turbolegs
Eventually got to this one yesterday and was able to finish it a little quicker than I normally can for this setter – was obviously right on his wave length – and getting A PIG IN A POKE at first look certainly opened up the puzzle.
Lots of interesting word play to have to work through, especially with 9a, 14a, 21a and 17d (which took a while to see the PRU (Prudential) part).
Thought GOSH was the standout and was pleased to dredge up BARBICAN from the depths of memory somehow.
Finished with TUTORIAL (neat and to the point that tricked me for a bit), that PRURIENT and DESIRE (where the parsing of that took nearly as long as filling in the whole grid – that DES RES term another that eventually came from memories of past solves).