Preamble: Eleven clues each have a single definitional misprint: the correct letters may be arranged to give the two word theme to be written under the grid. Five clues without definition lead to four candidates in a debatable thematic list of seven. Answers to twenty clues must be thematically adjusted before entry: wordplay and letter-counts refer to their entries. In the final grid, solvers must appropriately highlight the complete list of candidates (46 cells in total).
Firstly, thanks to Duncan for blogging IQ1383 for me. I’ve been flitting between Britain and Ireland for a few weeks due to a family bereavement and I’ve had no time for Inquisitors in general, let alone blogs. Still, the show must go on and I’m back!
I found this puzzle quite tough and there are still one or two loose ends which, thus far, I’ve been unable to tie up. Unfortunately, I also feel that it was a bit of a curate’s egg. đ
There was a lot of thematic material and I fail to see why the corrected misprints had to be jumbled – if there was a thematic element to this that I’ve missed then apologies all round. “Five clues … lead to four candidates …” was also a strange phrase to deal with but at least I figured that one out. Twenty answers had to be thematically adjusted and I’ve only, successfully, identified eighteen of them – I look forward to readers’ comments where the other two are concerned.
The whole basis of the puzzle was carbon being kicked out in favour of renewable energy sources. The twenty (or in my case, eighteen) answers all contained the letter C (occasionally more than once) which was to be omitted from the grid. I’ve indicated them in the following tables as [C]. The five non-definition clues (13a, 21a, 7d, 8d, 12d) led to NU[C]LEAR FUSION, GEOTHERMAL, NU[C]LEAR FISSION, HYDROELE[C]TRI[C] with 7d (NU[C]LEAR) doing double duty. The three remaining energy sources were WAVE (d7-g7), SOLAR (c4-c8) and WIND (d7-d10). All these have to be highlighted in an appropriate colour. No prizes for guessing the appropriate colour!
The corrected letters were GGNEYERERNE, which can be rearranged to make GREEN ENERGY and the seven entries constitute our debatable list of renewable sources.
I guess the last part is the title GoGo presumably refers to GO=green as in traffic lights and GO=energy.
As previously hinted, I wasn’t overly impressed with the puzzle as a whole. I found the clues on the tough side, together with the fact that there were a “million” different things to do, and there wasn’t much fun involved. Maybe it’s just because I was a little out of practice. Nevertheless, many thanks to Wickball.
P.S. Anyone want to buy a book of Mother-in-Law jokes??
(Dedicated to Gwendoline Iris Palmer, 1933-2015). RIP.
| Across |
|||||
| No. |
Clue |
Misprint |
Letter |
Entry |
Wordplay |
| 1 | Top agreement with both sides bursting bubble, say |
AIRLO[C]K | AI (a1:top)+OK (agreement) containing Left+Right (both sides) | ||
| 5 | Midge initially struggling with tent-flap |
SANDFLY | Struggling (initially)+AND (with)+FLY (tent-flap) | ||
| 10 | Leased independent houses over Kansas location |
LEOTI | LET (leased)+Independent containing Over | ||
| 13 | Enjoyment cut short by return of unceasing racket |
FUSION | FUn (enjoyment; cut short)+NOISe (racket; unceasing; rev: return of) | ||
| 16 | A river bridge | [C]APO | A+PO (river) | ||
| 17 | Radical change to a style with special dispensation? |
A[C]ETYL | A sTYLE ((minus Special) anag: change to) | ||
| 18 | Issued a speed violation |
ES[C]APED | A SPEED (anag: violation) | ||
| 19 | Turn over a tree | A[C]ER | Not really sure about this one, at all đ I think the tree is ACER giving one of the two extra Carbons that I can’t otherwise find
See comment 2 (below) |
||
| 20 | Sprint ace trails second person at the start |
sprinT->sprinG | G |
SPA | Ace following Second Person (first letters: at the start) |
| 21 | Government hit back, holding Congress after deposing its two leaders [no definition] |
GEOTHERMAL | Government+LAM (hit; rev: back) containing thE OTHER (sexual intercourse: congress; minus first two letters: TH) | ||
| 23 | Draw everything you heard about |
ALLURE | ALL (everything)+U (sounds like “you”)+RE (about) | ||
| 24 | Perverted irony of preservation method |
[C]RYONI[C] | IRONY (anag: perverted) | ||
| 25 | Scottish gull eating a parrot |
MA[C]AW | MAW (Scottish gull) containing A | ||
| 27 | In transit gave a timely warning |
[C]AVEAT | gAVE A Timely (hidden: in) (not really sure what TRANSIT’s role is) |
||
| 29 | Look down on short cut no longer in use |
SNEE (obsolete: no longer in use) |
SNEEr (look down on; short) | ||
| 31 | Vitamin in fruit rind | [C]ITRIN | fruIT RINd (hidden: in) | ||
| 35 | Membrane in half the population previously unknown |
MENINX | MEN (half the population [allegedly])+IN+X (unknown) | ||
| 38 | Uneasy entente with Henry, drinking in The Watering Hole? |
NINETEENTH | ENTENTE (anag: uneasy) containing IN followed by Henry | ||
| 39 | Festival broadcast surrender |
[C]EDE | Not sure on this one either đ I think CEDE = surrender giving one of the two extra Carbons that I can’t otherwise find
See comment 1 (below) |
||
| 40 | In sum, 751 rods | Rods->Gods | G |
DEI | D (500)+E (250)+I (one) in sum indicates that you have to add them together to make 751 rather than the more acceptable DCCLI |
| 41 | Touchy-feely story about origins of Tahitian islanders |
TA[C]TILE | TALE (story) containing Tahitian Islanders (first letters: origins) | ||
| 44 | Johnâs holy map of France? Thatâs right… |
maP->maN | N |
FRIER (according to John Milton) |
FRance+IE (that is)+Right |
| 45 | …briefly turning circle | ORB | BROther (ref: preceding clue; briefly; rev: turning) | ||
| 46 | Sitter at intervals may use life preserving drug |
sItter->sEtter | E |
MYSELF | MaY uSe LiFe (at intervals) containing Ecstasy (drug) |
| 47 | I have to follow the winding road â on one? |
DRIVE | I’VE (I have) following RD (road; rev: winding) (this is one of those &lit clues that I’m never too comfortable blogging. Solving: yes, blogging: no) |
||
| 48 | Gran, for example, another among the fifth-raters? |
graN->graY (ref: Thomas Gray) |
Y |
ELEGIST | E-LIST (fifth raters as compared to A-LIST – hence the question mark) containing EG (for example) |
| 49 | Blue community rejected order |
INDENT | INDecENT (blue) EC (community) rejected | ||
| Down |
|||||
| No. |
Clue |
Misprint |
Letter | Entry |
Wordplay |
| 1 | Blind priestâs upwardly mobile school |
blInd->blEnd | E |
AMALGAM | LAMA (priest; rev: upwardly mobile)+GAM (school) |
| 2 | Run loose, foul oily liquid |
[C]REOSOL | Run+LOOSE (anag: foul) | ||
| 3 | Sewer turning up odd bits of a cagoule |
[C]LOA[C]A | A cAgOuLe (odd bits; rev: turning up) | ||
| 4 | Bind a northern corporation |
biNd->biRd | R |
KITE | corporation=belly=KITE (in northern parts of the UK) |
| 6 | Grass up yours truly â Iâm blazing! |
AFLAME | ALFA (grass; rev: up)+ME yours truly) | ||
| 7 | Hopelessly unreal [no definition] |
NU[C]LEAR | UNREAL (anag) | ||
| 8 | Transgender operation on church outpost |
FISSION | mISSION (church outpost; with Male changed to Female – hence, transgender operation – OUCH! đ ) | ||
| 9 | Intricate inlayâs doubtful |
[C]YNI[C]AL | INLAY (anag: intricate) | ||
| 11 | Short phrase in middle of sentence about volcanic ash |
TEPHRA | PHRase inside senTEnce (middle of)+About | ||
| 12 | Hot Tory relied on misrepresentation |
HYDROELE[C]TRI[C] | Hot+TORY RELIED ON (anag: misrepresentation) | ||
| 14 | Grim address in the Seychelles |
SURLY | SY (Seychelles) containing URL (Uniform Resource Locator; [internet] address) | ||
| 15 | Power restricted, with nothing initially working in fog |
foG->foE | E |
OPPONENT | O (0; nothing)+Power+PENT (restricted) containing ON (working) |
| 22 | After a time, topped with jubilation |
ELATEDLY | bELATEDLY (after a time; topped) | ||
| 26 | Divers at sea grease base |
[C]ARGEESE | GREASE (anag: at sea)+E (base) | ||
| 28 | Hovel on the edge of terrace without upward support |
hoveL->hoveR | R |
TEETER | TERrace containing TEE (support; rev: upward) |
| 30 | Hot book about one in farewell display |
EXHIBIT | Hot+Book containing I (1: one) inside EXIT (farewell) | ||
| 32 | Draw in whatâs owed | INDU[C]E | IN+DUE (what’s owed) | ||
| 33 | Engraversâ black lives are reflected interminably in sick old eyes |
liVes->liNes | N |
NIELLI | ILL (sick)+EINe (eyes; obsolete: old; interminably) (rev: reflected) |
| 34 | Strays back over the following tracts |
tracTs->tracEs | E |
SNIFFS | SINS (strays; rev: back) containing FF (the following) |
| 36 | Hooked on evil concoction |
IN LOVE | ON EVIL (anag: concoction) | ||
| 37 | Buzzer welcoming the morning suited |
BE[C]AME | BEE (buzzer) containing AM (the morning) | ||
| 42 | Tart dropping papers in road |
A[C]IDI[C] | AI (A1:road) containing ID (papers) | ||
| 43 | The first person without a dry eye has it |
IRID | I (the first person)+aRID (dry; without A) | ||
Panic. Can’t find my marked up copy of completed grid.
But l think l parsed 39A as follows:
Definition: surrender = CEDE.
Minus C gives EDE, which sounds like (broadcast) EID, the Muslim festival.
I agree with you that 19A yields a C. I parsed it as:
Definition tree = ACER. Take away C. ‘Turn’ meaning reverse gives REA.
‘Over’ = RE, ‘a’ = A.
(Sorry kenmac. Bit crass of me to leap in without saying I am sorry to hear of your sad loss. Please excuse me.)
Firstly, we are really sorry to hear about your Mother-in-Law Kenmac.
Secondly, we enjoyed the puzzle. It took us a while to get started and if it had not been for the theme, we would never have solved a couple of the clues. Seeing the possibility of WIND and WAVE was the breakthrough.
Thanks for the blog.
Also thanks to Wickball for the challenge.
JS @2:
Hmm… I did think of REA but I can only find RHEA in my dictionaries. (blog updated)
JS @1:
As for EID, I think that you’re right, though it’s not listed in its own right in Chambers. (blog updated)
JS @3:
Don’t worry about it – it wouldn’t have even crossed my mind if you hadn’t mentioned it.
Sorry to hear of your loss.
You do in fact have 20 de-carboned clues – NUCLEAR and HYDROELECTRIC are two of the 20 (The preamble does not say 20 FURTHER clues!!)
Early on in solving, I considered PEE (see in column 2).
Not being silly. Try googling ‘pee power’.
It was certainly tougher than usual, more like a Listener, though given the average level of difficulty of this year’s Listeners I’d say it was possibly slightly harder than the average one. The toughness didn’t curtail my enjoyment at all, merely ratcheted up the challenge. I found things got rather easier once I’d solved two or three thematic clues and saw the pattern. I thought the clues were mostly very neat indeed – concisely constructed with smooth surfaces. Like kenmac, I couldn’t see the purpose of ‘transit’ in 27a, though it’s not the first time I’ve seen a hidden clue with an extraneous word, and I didn’t like the inelegant cryptic construction of 15d; to arrive at OPPONENT you’ve got force a very unnatural, clunky cryptic syntax out of the clue. There were one or two others a bit like that but this was the most extreme example.
I don’t think there was any thematic reason for the jumbling of the letters of the theme word, but I don’t see a problem with that – more of an advantage since it defers the revelation of the precise theme until the very end when the solver has all the letters.
Agree that this was a hard one. I didn’t help myself by initially ignoring the fact that the wordplay led to the entry, not the answer – after I realised my mistake I certainly speeded up (from very slow to quite slow), and like Andy Stewart @8 twigged the C omission after solving two or three of ‘those’ clues.
Further held up by having the obvious anagram at 7d as NEURAL. The top right eventually sorted itself out when I got 13a FUSION and resolved 7d as NU[C]LEAR, realising that some of the thematic entries where included in the 20 to be treated before entry (as starburst @6 notes). FISSION at 8d was the last entry I managed to justify.
And I didn’t have to wait until the very end to reveal the two-word theme – it was quite possible to guess with a few letters missing if one had the ‘four candidates’.
Thanks kenmac (welcome back) & Wickball – for a puzzle that drifted into my Bank Holiday Monday after a busy weekend.
Thanks kenmac and sympathies for your loss, I know what it’s like with the travelling back and forth, I had 3 funerals in a year in the US in 2012….
Anyway, I actually quite enjoyed this one, the different puzzling strands came together rather neatly about two-thirds through I got the C omissions quite quickly (I thought, TA(C)TILE and (C)REOSOL were giveaways) and managed to parse 24A from scratch, and by that time I had a few Es, and one G two Rs and the Y.
So, thanks to Wickball for a very entertaining puzzle.
“No prizes for guessing the appropriate colour!”, says kenmac, and no prosecco heading our way this week, since I (as official grid filler and checker chez nous) overlooked that particular instruction and used the first highlighter to hand, which I think was orange. It’s particularly annoying as we spent more time than usual on this one as despite our spotting the carbon omission theme early on, those 20 clues took a lot of sorting out. I’m surprised nobody else has mentioned that it seemed rather unsatisfactory to be highlighting a couple of non-words among the thematic group.
With thanks and condolences to kenmac.
Terrier @ 11,
Initially I felt the same as you about the non-word thematic entries.
But later I felt it was good to be shaken out of the mindset that there are accepted conventions that we expect to be observed.
Obviously, there were lots of non-word entries in the grid as a whole, so maybe that should have alerted us. And, very often, when we are required to alter words before entry, we are told in the preamble that all entries are real words – which we weren’t on this occasion.
In the end, I think this added to the challenge and the entertainment.
As ever, we will all have different views on various aspects of any puzzle. Long may it be so.
Thank you Wickball. Thank you kenmac.
Condolences to kenmac and many thanks for a thorough and comprehensive blog during what must have been a stressful time.
Thanks also to B&J @4, AS @ 8, RH @ 10 and JS @ 12 for your encouraging comments.
And grateful thanks to John H for his patience and help. As a comparative rookie at this game, I needed keeping on the straight and narrow with some of my clueing.
This is getting to read like a BAFTA acceptance speech, so Iâll move on to some of the issues raised above:
⢠39A: My Chambers gives the two festivals, Eid al-Adha & Eid al-Fitr. In my limited experience, as a non-Muslim, the second of these is commonly referred to simply as Eid.
⢠27A: Sorry about âtransitâ â an editorial change that slipped through the net.
⢠Theme title: The letters were intentionally jumbled, hopefully to delay the PDM, as noted by AS @ 8.
⢠The two theme ânon-wordsâ: I thought long and hard about this. Either I included the Cs in ânuclearâ & âhydroelectricâ, which would contravene the theme, or I rejected these words and looked for alternatives, although I suppose âfissionâ & âfusionâ would stand on their own. Had I encountered it, maybe I could have included JSâs âpee-powerâ!
Looking forward to S&B at York in October.
I thought this was a lot of fun. Tricky clueing – but, on the whole, the answers were very clear when you got them (not always the case!). This was a puzzle with a relatively quick PDM (for me) – that the absent Cs were carbon-related. But it continued to be an elusive and tantalising solve -and not at all a slog.
Thanks Kenmac for clarifying where I went wrong…
Late to this one. Many thanks to Wickball for a puzzle that I enjoyed immensely and didn’t find too tricky (although harder than usual).
Our condolences to kenmac.
My thanks to Wickball and kenmac. No real trouble this week with this one, the theme coming to me quicker than normal thanks to 12D. Solar, wind and wave were amongst the first to appear in my grid so fairly plain sailing. 10A was LOI for me. That one took a bit of hunting online.
I shaded in according to the introduction, thanks to a green pencil borrowed from someone. My stationery cupboard unfortunately doesn’t stretch to such specialist materials.
Incidentally, a recent win on IQ 1381 has yet to realise the fizzy stuff. Is it usual to have to wait this long? No big deal but I’m sure previous wins have resulted in swifter prosecco delivery
Phil, I won a few weeks after you – the Prosecco was delivered exactly two weeks after the winners’ names were published.
I have just received an email from the Indy Editorial Assistant who is going to arrange a fizzy delivery. Many thanks to Nimrod for the helpful nudge in the right direction