Smashing puzzle from Gurney
Across
1 CAMSHAFT (engine part) MAC< (Scot returned) SHAFT (small handle)
5 ÉCLAIR (cake) (CAL[o]RIE)*
10 SCAMPER (run) S (second) CAMPER (van)
11 UKRAINE (country) UK (country) RAIN (wet weather) E[nter]
12 AMOUR (secret love) A M (male) OUR (of us)
13 IRON OXIDE (compound) (INDOOR EXI[t])*
14 MIND-BOGGLING (astonishing) MIND (object) BLOGGING moving L[abour]
18 FRANKINCENCE (gum) (FREE INN SNACK)*
21 UNINSURED (having no cover) (NUDE IS RUN)*
23 ALTER (make changes) sounds like ALTAR (church table)
24 TBILISI (capital of Georgia) BIL[l] in IS IT<
25 PRIVATE (whispered) IV (4 in Roman) in PRATE (talk)
26 RATHER (prefer) RAT (pest) HER (that woman)
Down
1 CASUAL (relaxed) AS (when) U in CAL
2 MEADOW (rural location) hidden in [bla]ME A DOW[nturn]
3 HYPERLINK (web feature) (IN REPLY)* in HK (Hong Kong)
4 FORBIDDEN FRUIT (not allowed) (RUB OFF DIRT DINE)*
6 CARGO (it’s carried) oCeAn ReGiOn
7 AB INITIO (Latin from the beginning) AB (seamen) IN (at home) IT (computers) IO (moon)
8 RE-EMERGE (appear again) REE[l] MERGE (join together)
9 OUT OF ONES DEPTH (at sea) (THE E FOOT POUNDS)*
15 GESTATION (development over time) (AGE ITS NOT)*
16 AFLUTTER (nervous) A[bandon] FL (Florida) UTTER (state)
17 PACIFIST (non-fighter) IF (provided) I (island) in PACT (agreement)
19 AT EASE (not worried) A TEASE (guy)
20 GREEDY (very eager) ERG< (work over) ED (editor) Y[ell]
22 SEINE (river) (I SEEN)*
( )* = anagram [ ] = omit < = reverse
No 14ac clues today! Thanks, Gurney, this was great fun.
Although not a full “& lit.”, I thought CARGO at 6dn was quite brilliant.
It’s so simple: has it been done before?
When solving, I stopped for a moment at 26ac. PREFER and RATHER are
easily interchangeable in sentences (so fine) – and yet one is only a verb
and the other is only an adverb. Does this happen often in crosswords?
In 1ac, I went for S + HAFT for ‘small handle’.
Thanks Gurney for a nice gentle end of week puzzle, and Jed for the blog, not 9d today
Many thanks, Jed, for the excellent blog and to you and the commenters for the kind remarks. Re RATHER, I guess that the inclusion of ‘would’ might be regarded as understood in the case of ‘rather’ with “I’d rather A to B” = “I prefer A to B”.
Comment #3 should have had the by-line Gurney.
for completeness
27a Chancery (court) chancer (one exploiting any opportunity) + y (end of the day)