It’s really difficult to know what to say in the preamble for Dac’s puzzles. They always have smooth surfaces and well-constructed clues but there is rarely anything ‘out of the ordinary’ that demands a comment. There’s nothing wrong with that in our opinion, in fact we can’t remember NOT enjoying solving one of his Wednesday puzzles. This one was no exception.
We found it hard to pick a favourite clue, but we really enjoyed 15Ac and 4D. Thanks Dac!
| Across | ||
| 1 | Blow, with socialists imposing sanction on House | |
| LEFT HOOK | LEFT (socialists) + OK (sanction) on, or after, HO (house) | |
| 5 | Investigated mood of tired person? | |
| PROBED | A tired person would be PRO (in favour of) BED | |
| 9 | Bishop, one in Calais reformed church | |
| BASILICA | B (bishop) + I (one) in an anagram of CALAIS – anagrind is ‘reformed’ | |
| 10 | I love seeing king and queen at a special event | |
| ADORER | R (king) + ER (queen) after A DO (special event) | |
| 12 | Growth of cereal under discussion | |
| RISE | A homonym of RYES (cereal) – should ‘cereal’ be in the plural? | |
| 13 | Clergyman from Spanish island? No, French | |
| MINOR CANON | MINORCA (Spanish island) + NON (no, in French) | |
| 15 | Sort of fab girl that I love? Not half | |
| A BIT OF ALL RIGHT | Cryptic definition – An anagram of FAB GIRL THAT I LO |
|
| 18 | Stand good chance of being chosen to participate in race? | |
| BE IN THE RUNNING | A play on the fact that to participate in a race could be reinterpreted as to BE IN THE RUNNING | |
| 20 | Gosh! Quite a bit of publicity for plugging musical | |
| MY FAIR LADY | MY (gosh!) + FAIRLY (quite a bit) with AD (publicitiy) inside or ‘plugging’ | |
| 22 | Listen to me removing articles from Volkswagen | |
| PSST | P |
|
| 24 | Anger as English harvest suffers setback, ultimately failing | |
| ENRAGE | E (English) GARNE |
|
| 25 | One drives over hill covered in fog | |
| MOTORIST | O (over) + TOR (hill) ‘covered’ in MIST (fog) | |
| 26 | After start of December, first terrible problems with snow | |
| DRIFTS | D (first letter or ‘start’ of December) + an anagram of FIRST – anagrind is ‘terrible’ | |
| 27 | Literate learners were about to get a mediocre grade | |
| WELL-READ | LL (learners) with WERE around or ‘about’ + A + D (mediocre grade) | |
| Down | ||
| 1 | Politician’s mounting anger over African extremists from Monrovia? | |
| LIBERIAN | LIB (politician) + IRE (anger) reversed or ‘mounting’ + A |
|
| 2 | Chef is doubly inept, holding large kitchen utensil | |
| FISH SLICE | Anagram of CHEF IS IS (doubly) – anagrind is ‘inept’ – round or ‘holding’ L (large) | |
| 3 | Introductions from Horatio Lord Nelson? | |
| HOLD | HO |
|
| 4 | When can I lie about with nothing on top? Not very often | |
| ONCE IN A WHILE | Anagram of WHEN CAN I LIE (anagrind is ‘about’) with O (nothing) at the beginning or ‘on top’ | |
| 6 | Changes in Soviet behaviour | |
| REDACTIONS | RED (Soviet) + ACTIONS (behaviour) | |
| 7 | Magnate put up in a manor abroad | |
| BARON | Hidden in reverse or ‘put up’ in maNOR ABroad | |
| 8 | Bold group of American lawyers | |
| DARING | A play on a group of American lawyers being a DA (District Attorney) RING | |
| 11 | Animal, very fast, first of all caught bird | |
| COLLARED DOVE | DOE (animal) round or holding ‘fast’ V (very), with COLLARED (caught) at first | |
| 14 | Indicating cement work on walls of apartment | |
| POINTING AT | POINTING (‘cement work’ as in the joints between bricks) + A |
|
| 16 | Top fixer sorted out Irish deal | |
| HAIR SLIDE | Anagram of IRISH DEAL (anagrind is ‘sorted out’) | |
| 17 | Worried a soldier’s declared missing at the outset | |
| AGITATED | A GI (soldier) + |
|
| 19 | Threaten mischief maker with death! | |
| IMPEND | IMP (mischief maker) + END (death) | |
| 21 | Regularly showing flair, one’s picked up a foreign language | |
| FARSI | Alternate letters of FlAiR (‘regularly’) + I’S (one’s) reversed or ‘picked up’ | |
| 23 | Maybe saw plunder being lifted | |
| TOOL | LOOT (plunder) reversed or ‘lifted’ | |
As I’ve said before, Dac just keeps on churning out quality puzzles that are fun to solve.
I also wondered about the plural in RISE/ryes, but if you read “cereal” as an adjective rather than a noun it probably works. PROBED was my LOI and raised a smile when the penny dropped.
Thanks B&J and Dac. Enjoyable, as usual. My CoD was 11d – the answer was obvious enough from the crossing letters but working out the wordplay took a little while!
Thanks Dac for a generally enjoyable crossword and B&J for the blog. I would call 15ac a complete “& lit” clue, but there seem to be so many different meanings of that term floating around now that it is losing its usefulness, which is a pity.
12ac: I took this as an imperfect homophone of “rice”. Obviously “ryes” works better if the word exists. The only meaning of rye that I can find which takes a valid plural is “(a glass of) rye whisk(e)y”, but I do not think that could be clued by “cereal”. Andy B’s suggestion @1 does not work for me. I will of course be delighted if someone can find a more appropriate meaning.
13ac: No problem for those who are happy for occasional ambiguous clues to be resolved by checking letters, but MAJOR CANON fits the clue just as well as MINOR CANON. It is true that Chambers 2008 only gives minor canon, but I found major canon in an online dictionary. Even sticking to Chambers, I think it is asking a bit much of the solver to know that only one of the two obvious possibilities exists.
Steady progress until I gave up with 11d, 19d,21d 20a & 24a unsolved.
I’m afraid I don’t see how the v gets into doe. How exactly does fast mean insert?
Thanks
Thanks both.
You do run out of stuff to say about Dac’s Wednesday puzzles, but I too was tickled by PROBED this morning.
Following on from Pelham’s comment, I for one have lost the plot with what exactly defines an ‘&lit’ or ‘all-in-one’ clue these days. Not that it matters much: if the clue points me unambiguously towards the answer, I am a happy bunny.
I would describe RICE as a grain rather than a cereal, but I suppose it could be the latter. Where’s a botanist when you need one?
Good, enjoyable puzzle.
Thanks Bertandjoyce; Bamberger @4 my Oxford Thesaurus gives: ‘his hand slammed against the door holding it fast’ with fastened, secured, firmly fixed as synonyms.
Kathryn’s Dad @5; Chambers gives for rice: ‘its grain an important cereal food,’ so I guess that is OK, then. 🙂
I liked the HAIR SLIDE as ‘top fixer.’
People hereabouts have – phew! – taken different positions on it, but I give 15 &lit status. The ‘sort of’ seemed a little superfluous, but with the ‘not half’ added on it regains its credulity, just about! And, you need all the bits.
Thanks Dac and blogger for great stuff, much appreciated.
In a certain light rice can sound like rise. Try prolonging the ‘I” and making a z.This was enough to satisfy me anyway.I had 20ac without the faintest idea of how it worked, so many thanks B&J.
Good puzzle DAC, keep it up.
For &lits I take the view, which may very well not be universal, that if the absolutely whole clue can be taken as the definition then it’s an &lit. Otherwise it just has &littish qualities, although how those are defined I’m not sure. Some people call it a partial &lit, some an &.lit, and so far as I can see Azed, who should know about these things, simply an &lit.
As always a whole mass of lovely clues. Last week I questioned one of Dac’s clues and it was immediately clear why I was wrong. This time I’ll ask what ‘imposing’ is doing in 1ac and no doubt it will again be perfectly obvious.
If I ‘impose’ OK on HO in an across clue, I’d be happy enough to get a HOOK. A bit flowery (not that I can talk), but it does the job, and facilitates the neat Dac surface.
On &lits I agree with you completely – how the criteria ever got to vary from yours is beyond me.