Guardian, 24492 (Brummie)

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Didn’t find this easy and am still unsure about 9a

Across
9 RANCOROUS: ANCOR in anagram of SOUR; but why ANCOR? (is it a homophone of ANCHOR)
12,3 WONDERFUL COPENHAGEN: WONDERFUL (modern meaning of WICKED) + C + OPEN (frank) + HAG + EN (as in en dash); from ‘Hans Christian Andersen’
13 MUGSHOT: MUG’S (stein’s) + HOT
17 VYING: dYING losing ‘d’ and gaining ‘V’ (very)
19,1 MANTRAP: MA + N (end of ruin) + GIN (a trap)
20 LARGO: LARGe losing ‘e’ and gaining ‘O’
21 ERMINED: ER (King Edward) + MINED
22 LIBRARY: &Lit (as in a book may turn up but noise volume may not)
24 GESTATION: anangram of ON STAGE IT
26,14 APRIL IN PARIS: anagram of L PAIR and ASPIRIN; and AVRIL is APRIL IN PARIS
28,16 GHOST STORY: G HOST + STORY
29 HOOVER DAM: HOOVER + DAM
Down
2 UNKING: sUNKING without the ‘s’
4 GODWIT: WIT following GOD
5 ASUNCION: A SUN + anagram of ICON; capital city of Paraguay
7 SEAFARER: FARE in SEAR
8 IDOL: I’D + O + L
13 MOVIE: I (start of innocence) in MOVE
15 PALLBEARER: &Lit
19,18 MIDNIGHT IN MOSCOW: MIDNIGHT (kind of blue) + IN (popular) + MO (Maureen) + S (bob, shilling) + COW (Daisy)
22,11 LONDON PRIDE: I think this is a double definition
23 ABRADE: A BRA + D + E (top of elastic)
24,6 GIGABYTE: GIG + A BYTE (sounds like a bite)
25 ARTY: heARTY less ‘he’
27 LIME: sLIME without the ‘s’ (sulphur)

15 comments on “Guardian, 24492 (Brummie)”

  2. I was puzzled by 9ac for a while too, but it’s AN=one) COR=I say! in SOUR*

    I found this rather a strange puzzle – a mixture of hard and easy. I wasn’t keen on 19/1, where TRAP has the same meaning in both the wordplay and the answer.

    Interesting coincidence to have he(ARTY) in this one after our discussions a couple of days ago.

  3. I thought this was tough but very satisfying to finish.

    I, too, got hung up on ‘anchor’ in 9ac.

    I thought 2dn was pretty audacious [‘king’ as a verb is rather archaic – but to ‘unking?] but it made me laugh.

    I puzzled over the anagram fodder for 26,14. Can ‘l’ really be an abbreviation for ‘little’ as well as ‘large’? I’m ashamed to say it took me a few minutes to realise that ‘Avril’ was the definition – I might have expected some reference to 13dn for this answer.

    10ac was the last one I put in, after finally getting the ‘y’ from ‘byte’. I’d spent ages puzzling over a word for ‘cave’ to put inside a word for ‘bear’.

    I thought there were some great clues, with excellent surfaces [e.g. 22ac and 24ac] and I liked the construction of 17ac and 20ac. I don’t have a problem with 19.1: the reference to ‘Mother’s ruin’ was too good to miss!

  5. I thought the wordplay for 26/14 was PR in AIL for “little pair in distress”, followed by anag of ASPIRIN (dished out), which I think works better than having “little” mean L.

    Can somebody please explain 10ac?

  6. 10a double definition, yield as in ‘bear fruit’ and ‘cave in’ (in cave? No other way round) or ‘give way under pressure’.

  7. 26/14: JamieC’s explanation works for me – but I still feel it needs a further definition: ‘April in Paris’ doesn’t mean anything, except as a 13dn or a song.

  8. I agree with Eileen about the lack of definition for APRIL IN PARIS. There’s an unstated mini-theme of song titles in the puzzle – A in P is one, as are MIDNIGHT IN MOSCOW, WONDERFUL COPENHAGEN (both indicated their clue) and LONDON PRIDE (Noel Coward), so it’s a bit of a pity that it wasn’t made slightly more explicit. Stretching the point a bit too far we also have Handel’s LARGO and the Harry LIME theme…

  9. In 21 across, does “was exploitative” really work for MINED? As usual, I guess I’ve just misunderstood, but I’d have thought it should be “exploited” or “was exploited”…

    This was a good level of difficulty for a daily puzzle, I thought – pretty tough, but nothing so unapproachable that I got really stuck at any point. (10 across was the last one I got – without understanding the construction, unfortunately.)

  11. I thought ‘Avril’ was the definition for 26/14 and in Paris, France it’s what they’d say for April, so Avril = April in France/Paris/French. I don’t see the problem really.

  12. Can I please have 10 across explained?

    I understand that YIELD can be both ‘bear’ and ‘cave’, but I don’t get the ‘No, other way round’ part of the clue.

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