Hello everyone. Today, a Skylark and a Kitty coincide …
The preamble:
Nine clues contain an extra word to be removed before solving. In order they are the start of a work by A, followed by the beginning of a series by B. Each remaining clue includes an extra letter to be removed before solving. In order, these spell what solvers must highlight (22 cells in all), involving a COINCIDENCE. Chambers (2016) is recommended.
Most of the solve went smoothly, although I met a little pocket of difficulty before the end, just in a spot where I couldn’t quite decipher what the missing letters would be. Once found, the full set of letters indicated what we’d need to highlight:
NAME OF A AND PEN NAME OF B SHOW TIME AND TITLE
The extra words from clues hadn’t proved hard to identify, even the short ones which can be tricky. The work by A and the beginning of the series by B are:
IT WAS A BRIGHT COLD DAY IN // THE DEFENCE
Initially I split this in slightly the wrong place (before “in”), but more on that later.
I would have been disappointed in myself had I not recalled the opening sentence of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four. “It was a bright cold day” was definitely familiar from somewhere, but only spotting ERIC BLAIR in the grid unlocked the rest from memory: “It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.”
So far, so good. I determined to continue without internet searching unless/until absolutely necessary …
… some time and grid-staring later, I decided it was necessary! Unfortunately, my initial searches were of no help. I thought of coincidences involving author names and pen names, but exhausted that investigation. Then it seemed clear that the coincidence must surely be something happening at the same time – that is, as the clocks struck 13 or in the 13th hour. Clocks striking 13 in literature was an interesting avenue of research, but not one which ultimately proved fruitful.
I mentioned earlier that I had split the extra words in the wrong place. I had been looking for “In the defence …” to begin B’s series, inexplicably never thinking to shift the “in” back into the opening of 1984 where it belonged. So that something-ed up my search, as I humphed at all the suggestions for “The defence” which came back. Oops.
After combing the grid thoroughly I determined that the remaining 13 cells to be highlighted could not be in (a) straight line(s) and realised they would likely form a 3 to complete a 13 shape. I eventually found STEVE, and then a surname: STEVE CAVANAGH. Never heard of him, I thought. Finally, I found the series by that author, the first book of which is The Defence. Then, a little later in the series, the book I was looking for. The one whose TITLE is the same as the TIME from the previous work: THIRTEEN.
At this point I recognised the tagline of Thirteen – and realised I had in fact read this very book a few years ago. Aargh! Massive-self-kick duly administered. For anyone unfamiliar, I think it completely understandable that this second step might have taken a while. But I cannot claim to be unlucky, just extremely forgetful.
Thanks to Skylark for the hunt and the face-palm moment. I have made the journey from smug to “I am such a numbskull” (actual language may be stronger than that presented) many times, but seldom as enjoyably as this!
| # | ANSWER | Clue with definition underlined | ||
| Explanation, with quoted indicators in italics and ANSWER letters in bold caps | ||||
| Across | ||||
| 1a | PSYCHOPATHIST | [N]eat interrupting oddly pushy heartless non-believer in God, student of mental disorders (13) | N | |
| CHOP (eat) going between (interrupting) oddly PuShY and ATHeIST (non-believer in God) without its middle letter (heartless …) | ||||
| 10a | OFLAG | B[a]y convict German POW camp (5) | A | |
| OF (by) + LAG (convict) | ||||
| 12a | ACTABLE | [M]aster’s opening telegram, accepting Kismet’s finale is suitable for the stage (7) | M | |
| Aster’s first letter (opening) + CABLE (telegram) taking in (accepting) KismeT’s last letter (finale) | ||||
| 13a | ELVER | Liberal feeding at[e] all young fish (5) | E | |
| L (Liberal) going into (feeding) EVER (at all) | ||||
| 14a | TELLUS | Plat[o] finally backing almost dismal Roman goddess (6) | O | |
| PlaT finally + reversed (backing) all but the last letter of (almost) SULLEn (dismal) | ||||
| 16a | AS IS | Unaltered pedestal, bishop’s dismissed [it] (4, 2 words) | it | |
| [b]ASIS (pedestal) in which B (bishop)’s removed (dismissed) | ||||
| 17a | VIES | Contests power accepting [f]east (4) | F | |
| VIS (power) taking in (accepting) E (east) | ||||
| 18a | DERISION | Mockery turning scarlet, fancy skipping volt[a] (8) | A | |
| Reversing (turning) RED (scarlet) + [v]ISION (fancy) omitting (skipping) V (volt) | ||||
| 21a | TICKLE | Please record [A]dele, missing Delaware (6) | A | |
| TICK (record) + [de]LE missing DE (Delaware) | ||||
| 22a | CRUEL | Vintage letter [was] severe (5) | was | |
| CRU (vintage) + EL (letter) | ||||
| 23a | PROBLEMATICAL | Doubtful, ratio[n] Campbell in mess (13) | N | |
| RATIO CAMPBELL anagrammed (in mess) | ||||
| 27a | TABLE | Panel time poet’s [D]inky, ignoring seconds (5) | D | |
| T (time) + [s]ABLE (poet’s inky) omitting (ignoring) S (seconds) | ||||
| 29a | SÈVRES | [P]reviewing deals French porcelain (6) | P | |
| Going backwards (reviewing) SERVES (deals) | ||||
| 33a | UNLEARNT | Not[e] gleaned matron regularly breaks one rural permit (8) | E | |
| Taking alternate letters (… regularly), mAtRoN goes into (breaks) UN (one rural) and LET (permit) | ||||
| 34a | TOPI | [N]one pursuing chief’s hat (4) | N | |
| I (one) following (pursuing) TOP (chief) | ||||
| 35a | ECHO | Will’s to eke out [a] round copy (4) | a | |
| ECH (Will’s to eke out) + O (round) | ||||
| 39a | ICARIA | Greek island song following limitless mi[n]ce (6) | N | |
| ARIA (song) following mICe without outer letters (limitless …) | ||||
| 40a | AGGRO | Trouble within gag[a] group (5) | A | |
| This is hidden within gAG GROup | ||||
| 41a | ORIENTS | Determines the position of [m]ore tins working (7) | M | |
| ORE TINS anagrammed (working) | ||||
| 42a | ELEMI | Resinous substance held in centre, issue [bright] Tesla’s ignored (5) | bright | |
| Middle letters of (… in centre) hELd + EMI[t] (issue) when T (Tesla)’s ignored | ||||
| 43a | NIDDLE-NODDLES | Waggles mobile lin[e], ends doddle (13) | E | |
| An anagram of (mobile) LIN, ENDS DODDLE | ||||
| Down | ||||
| 1d | PREADAPTATION | Possession of future evolutionary advantage is apparent to aid sh[o]ot (13) | O | |
| APPARENT TO AID anagrammed (shot) | ||||
| 2d | SOLE | Broadcast [cold] spirit alone (4) | cold | |
| Homophone of (broadcast) SOUL (spirit) | ||||
| 3d | CLERIC | Circle [f]rocks churchman (6) | F | |
| CIRCLE is anagrammed (rocks) | ||||
| 4d | HARD | Firm owned stocking [b]rand (4) | B | |
| HAD (owned) containing (stocking) R (rand) | ||||
| 5d | PASS | [S]lap southern fool standing (4) | S | |
| S (southern) and SAP (fool) entered upwards (standing) | ||||
| 6d | ACTINIA | Sea anemone protein institute [h]ails at first (7) | H | |
| ACTIN (protein) + I (institute) + Ails at first | ||||
| 7d | HALVER | Crossing L[o]ire, talk nonsense to Scot semi-cut (6) | O | |
| Going around (crossing) L (lire), HAVER (talk nonsense to Scot) | ||||
| 8d | IBLIS | Che[w] ecstasy, almost devil to some (5) | W | |
| I (che) + BLISs (ecstasy), almost | ||||
| 9d | TESSELLATIONS | Mosaics upset minor, cutting tar[t]e delights (13) | T | |
| Reversed (upset) LESS (minor) going into (cutting) T (tare) and ELATIONS (delights) | ||||
| 11d | GRAIL | Bar[i] supports good cherished goal (5) | I | |
| RAIL (bar) goes beneath (supports) G (good) | ||||
| 15d | BRIO | Robin [Day] initially cutting biography’s vivacity (4) | day | |
| The first letter of (… initially) Robin going into (cutting) BIO (biography) | ||||
| 19d | ACT | [M]ace collect on borders deed (3) | M | |
| A (ace) + CollecT at its outer edges (on borders) | ||||
| 20d | PEAS | D[e]als birds no longer (4) | E | |
| Two definitions | ||||
| 21d | TRAP | G[a]in power and skill climbing (4) | A | |
| P (power) and ART (skill) going upwards (climbing) | ||||
| 24d | LEX | League examined Latin law[n] (3) | N | |
| L (league) + EX. (examined) | ||||
| 25d | EDUCATE | Enlighten leader of [d]eluded English clutching antique gold coin (7) | D | |
| The first letter of (leader of) Eluded and E (English) around (clutching) DUCAT (antique gold coin) | ||||
| 26d | CERO | Last of flee[t] entering briefly gather fish (4) | T | |
| The final letter of (last of) fleeT going into (entering) all but the last letter of (briefly) CROp (gather) | ||||
| 28d | LAIRED | Anger cutting ma[i]n mired in Highlands (6) | I | |
| IRE (anger) inserted into (cutting) LAD (man) | ||||
| 30d | ELOGE | Panegyric is eastern [in] box at theatre (5) | in | |
| E (eastern) + LOGE (box at theatre) | ||||
| 31d | RANGED | Moved north, dons [t]ramped (6) | T | |
| N (north) dons RAGED (ramped) | ||||
| 32d | APAID | [The] American settled up, once satisfied (5) | the | |
| A (American) + PAID (settled up) | ||||
| 36d | HISN | Accepting spades, B[l]ack’s shedding diamonds belonging to him locally (4) | L | |
| Taking in (accepting) S (spades), HIN[d] (back) shedding D (diamonds) | ||||
| 37d | BALD | Blunt lecturer interrupts lousy [defence] (4) | defence | |
| L (lecturer) goes inside (interrupts) BAD (lousy) | ||||
| 38d | TRIE | Rot[e] drops page Ed’s to prove (4) | E | |
| TRI[p]E (rot) omits (drops) P (page) | ||||
HI Kitty,
Thank you so much for the very entertaining, and perfectly parsed, blog. I have face-palm moments almost daily!
Jo / Skylark
That almost exactly mirrors my solving experience (and enjoyment of the puzzle – I’d never come across Cavanagh, and it’s always good to learn something from a theme). One small thought, though – while it’s clear from the geometry that it’s the lower S of PASS to be highlighted, there’s a potential ambiguity there which could readily have been avoided (pats etc). Or have I missed something?
Ifor,
It could have been pats or paws or something, since it is the lower S to be highlighted (to maintain symmetry, as you spotted) but since none of my test solvers, the editor or his test solvers raised it, it never occurred to me that someone might think unsymmetrically.
So maybe it was me that missed something.
Best regards,
Jo / Skylark
Thanks for replying – I’m glad to hear that I wasn’t talking nonsense. As I said, it certainly didn’t affect either my solution or my enjoyment.
So. Having filled the grid, the solver has to figure out a series of works beginning ‘THE DEFENCE’. Genuinely curious to know if setter and editor are happy for the solver to spend many more hours searching Google for likely candidates than actually solving a puzzle
Skylark, I really enjoyed the puzzle – thanks. It was very satisfying and it was lovely how it all came together so well.
Kitty, thanks for the blog – interesting, informative and amusing in places (because of your ‘split’).
Bingy, I didn’t have to spend ‘many hours’ or even many minutes on Google. The book, possibly in the ‘best sellers’ lists at some points, was known to me. The Eric Blair line, introduction, is so well known that the rest of it – including the coincidence part – probably struck most people immediately. It didn’t take long to get from there to finishing off the puzzle.
Caran. I’m not sure what you mean. Obviously I knew the Orwell quote and book. I’m referring to the second element which is way more obscurer and indicated with a very vague hint. The fact that you happen to have read it was fortuitous rather than a fair indicator to those who hadn’t, the latter of whom I suspect were the majority
Bingy, sorry, I should have been clearer – the second book was the Steve Cavanagh one. As his books have sold millions and have been heavily borrowed, I don’t think of it as ‘obscure’. Even if he is not to someone’s taste, the best sellers lists featured the author’s name and titles fairly often, I think.
Thanks Skylark. I was fortunate enough to have been aware of Cavanagh’s work, having read Thirteen earlier this year.
RE: the ambiguity of shading in the 3. Oddly enough, I initially went wrong with my highlighting of the 1, using the ER of DERISION rather than the more obvious single straight line. It was only through thinking that it didn’t look quite right that made me look again.
I would say that there is always some degree of trade-off in the endgame of themed cryptics. If it were all just there staring at you from the grid, then there would be no pleasure in working it out, and anything is obscure to him who does not know it. I certainly had some grid-staring in this one, but given that really there was a double hint – The Defence as the start of a series (and Google’s first result when I type these words is indeed Cavanagh) plus the shape 13 in the grid – I would say that it was certainly on the fair side of things. I had neither read nor heard of Cavanagh.
I’ll be interested to read the blog and comments for the puzzle of the 18th of October, which, brilliant though it was, was somewhat closer to inscrutable in parts of its endgame.
Super puzzle with a nice twist in the highlighting and a good level of difficulty. There was plenty of hints regarding what to look for in the grid, so more of a case of deducing something to highlight than just a random wordfinder (which I usually find annoying). I had not heard of the Cavanagh series, but it was the first result thrown up by Google, so only a few seconds of searching required there. Thank you to all.