Some brilliant clues in this week’s plain puzzle.
I’m never wholly confident about attributing the & lit label to a clue, but there are three clues in this puzzle which I think justify the description: 7, 10 and 16 down. 7 down is remarkable in another way – I don’t think that I’ve ever seen a 12-letter word clued as a hidden word before, and in this case it’s reversed as well. Although there is still no sign of a clue-writing competition, solvers can have no cause for complaint while Gemelo is in this sort of form.
| ACROSS | ||
| 1 | ELAEAGNACEAE |
Tree and shrub family aged a decade, and led to change without any dead (12)
|
| *(AGED A DECADE AND LED) (omitting all the instances of the letter D(ead)). | ||
| 11 | MIDGE |
Fly westward for one tenth of a dollar, just about (5)
|
| E G (for one) DIM(e) (10 cents) (all rev). | ||
| 12 | AGUE |
Malaria epidemic putting paid to P&L (4)
|
| (pl)AGUE (epidemic). | ||
| 14 | GRAIN SIDE |
Where hair’s removed from showers I’d taken in middle of engagement (9, 2 words)
|
| RAINS (showers) I’D inside (enga)GE(ment). The term refers to how leather is treated. | ||
| 15 | ALL FOR |
Unusual floral backing (6, 2 words)
|
| *FLORAL. | ||
| 16 | ROC |
Legendarily, one could pick up jumbo crossword, totally accurately, only taking seconds (3)
|
| Second letters of cRossword tOtally aCcurately; I got this from the definition and only worked out the wordplay when I came to write the blog. Of course, this being a 3-letter word, it is fully checked so some may have filled it in without ever actually solving it. | ||
| 17 | REASSESSMENT |
Another look at sensor seems mad when nothing’s gone missing (12)
|
| *(AT SENS(o)R SEEMS). | ||
| 18 | RATITAE |
Flightless birds sing with allure, extremely attractive (7)
|
| RAT (sing, as in grass) IT (sex appeal or allure) A(ttractiv)E. | ||
| 20 | SAGO |
Talk about old product of palm tree (4)
|
| GAS (talk, rev) O(ld). | ||
| 21 | ATOC |
Skunk going through potato chips (4)
|
| Hidden in “potato chips”. | ||
| 23 | CLINGER |
Leech about to hang on (7)
|
| C (about) LINGER (hang on). | ||
| 25 | SCRATCH COATS |
First applications when decorating small crib no longer accepted in other cribs (12, 2 words)
|
| S(mall) CRATCH ( archaic dialect term for a manger or crib), A(ccepted) in COTS. | ||
| 27 | SAY |
Old woollen fabric, for example (3)
|
| Double definition. | ||
| 28 | FIANCE |
Country getting rid of king for one who’ll join union (6)
|
| FRANCE with I (one) replacing R(ex). Arguably “one” in the clue is doing double duty, but you could omit it from the definition so that “who” is a pronoun on its own. | ||
| 29 | IRON CROSS |
Offensive decoration not really meant to put out independent Scotsman? (9, 2 words)
|
| IRON(i)C (not really meant); ROSS (Scotsman). I think that “offensive” here is used to denote the fact that the Iron Cross is a military honour. | ||
| 31 | SO AS |
If only slogans could be regularly forgotten – likewise slow ads (4, 2 words)
|
| Two ways of hiding the letters alternately: SlOgAnS and SlOw AdS. | ||
| 32 | MOTET |
Choral composition came together without religious text (5)
|
| OT (Old Testament) inside MET (came together). | ||
| 33 | GAINLESSNESS |
Butcher sensing sale’s unprofitability (12)
|
| *(SENSING SALES). | ||
| DOWN | ||
| 1 | EMBARRASSING |
Stop scraping around section that’s awkward (12)
|
| EMBAR (stop), S(ection) inside RASING (scraping). | ||
| 2 | ADULATORY |
Fulsome man perhaps gaining year, one way or another? (9)
|
| ADULT (man) overlapping with A(nnus) OR Y(ear) (two abbreviations standing for “year”). The misuse of the word fulsome is one of my pet bugbears: the first definition in Chambers is “sickeningly obsequious” but it’s all too often used (with “apology”) to mean something like “lavish”. | ||
| 3 | EGG |
Bomb with long pins lacking shell (3)
|
| (l)EGG(y) (with long pins!). | ||
| 4 | AEROSTATICAL |
Upset Los Angeles citizen in painful argument, initially about ballooning (12)
|
| LA CIT (Los Angeles citizen) AT SORE (painful), A(rgument) (all rev). | ||
| 5 | GEAR |
Good part of cereal first? (4)
|
| G(ood) EAR (part of cereal). The question mark indicates that this is a definition by example: first gear. | ||
| 6 | NAINSEL |
Scottish Highlander is embracing nationalist during unproductive uprising (7)
|
| N(ationalist) inside IS, inside LEAN (unproductive, rev). | ||
| 7 | AGNOSTICISMS |
What contributes to rising skepticism [sic]? It’s on gaining empiric beliefs (12)
|
| Hidden and reversed (“rising”) in “skeptiism sic its on gaining”. Quite brilliant! | ||
| 8 | CUSUMS |
Copper, say, puts two and two together in language-based analyses (6)
|
| CU (copper) SUMS (puts two and two together). | ||
| 9 | ADD-ON |
Extra active duty to get into (5)
|
| AD (Active Duty) DON (put on, or get into). | ||
| 10 | EJECTOR SEATS |
Ultimately, people on planes, accepting cost, are thrown out – in these? (12, 2 words)
|
| (peopl)E, *(COST ARE) inside JETS (planes) & lit. Another piece of brilliance. | ||
| 13 | FLEA |
What takes blood, mainly? (4)
|
| I think that this parses as FLEA(m), a fleam being a lancet used to bleed diseased cattle. | ||
| 16 | REAGANITE |
Largely anti-Green American, possibly? (9)
|
| *(ANTI GREEN). Another & lit, although Green politics were not really prominent when Ronald Reagan was active in politics. | ||
| 19 | ACCURSE |
Damn accountant with unopened contract (7)
|
| ACC(ountant) (p)URSE (contract). | ||
| 22 | CANNON |
Gorge, eating new batter (6)
|
| N(ew) inside CANON. | ||
| 24 | ETCH |
Cut, and others like it, beginning to hurt (4)
|
| ETC (and others) H(urt). | ||
| 26 | CARTA |
Chief accountant concealing crafty conduct in formal writing (5)
|
| ART (crafty conduct) inside CA (Chief Accountant). | ||
| 28 | FOSS |
Moat with waterfall (4)
|
| Double definition. | ||
| 30 | SON |
Disciple, like priest, ignoring peripheral parish (3)
|
| (par)SON (priest). Given that par. is a recognised abbreviation for “parish”, I’m not quite sure if we need “peripheral” in the clue. |