Big Dave's Crossword Blog

Toughie No 1107 by Warbler

What the Dickens?

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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***

After last Tuesday’s mixup, normality returns with an easy straightforward puzzle. As befitting the date there is a seasonal flavour to the two long across clues.

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Across

1a    Scholar crams it almost all ingeniously into novel (1,9,5)
{A CHRISTMAS CAROL} – the wordplay here seems to have one letter too many – it’s an anagram (ingeniously) of SCHOLAR CRAMS IT A(LL) but almost suggests that the final element should be AL(L)

8a    Black bird‘s prey (5)
{RAVEN} – the name of this large black bird can also be a verb meaning to prey

9a    Around start of holidays imps are transformed into perfect angels (8)
{SERAPHIM} – the initial letter (start) of Holidays inside an anagram (transformed) of IMPS ARE

11a    City and lake in clover? (7)
{LUCERNE} – two definitions (or maybe three!) – a city that stands on a lake of the same name and another name for the purple medick, a plant resembling clover

12a    Happiness cut short by house’s rejection (5-2)
{HEAVE-HO} – a word meaning happiness or bliss without its final letter (cut short) followed by HO(ouse)

13a    Virile sort of chief, shunning public notice (2-3)
{HE-MAN} – a chief or leader without (shunning) AD (advertisement / public notice}

15a    Destroyed padre’s name almost & character (9)
{AMPERSAND} – an anagram (destroyed) of PADRE’S NAM(E) without the final letter (almost0 – did you spot the significance of & in the clue?

17a    Fish pasty temptation (9)
{WHITEBAIT} – an adjective meaning pasty or wan followed by a temptation (of the kind that might tempt a fish)

20a    Initially char leaves everything as new (5)
{CLEAN} – the initial letters of five words in the clue

21a    Judge delayed raise expenditure (7)
{REFLATE} – a judge or assessor followed by an adjective meaning delayed or overdue

23a    Closely examine torn label after end of the year (7)
{EYEBALL} – an anagram (torn) of LABEL after the final letter (end) of thE and Y(ear)

25a    At sea Maria, going aft, caught a large squid (8)
{CALAMARI} – an anagram (at sea) of MARIA follows (going aft) C(aught) A L(arge)

26a    The Spanish fish is cut off (5)
{ELIDE} – the Spanish definite article followed by a fish closely related to the chub gives a verb meaning to cut off a syllable in verse

27a    Sober geezer once reformed as protagonist in 1A (8,7)
{EBENEZER SCROOGE} – an anagram (re-formed) of SOBER GEEZER ONCE

Down

1d    Rainy spells bringing forth flowers in May proverbially (5,7)
{APRIL SHOWERS} – according to the proverb these rainy spells bring forth May flowers

2d    In Latin this edition of the Bible brings chaos (5)
{HAVOC} – the Latin for this (can you ever forget learning hic, haec …?) around the abbreviation for the Authorised Version of the Bible

3d    Lack of education in English can go right if corrected (9)
{IGNORANCE} – an anagram (corrected) of IN E(nglish) CAN GO R(ight)

4d    Small piece of mosaic being inserted into mobile art (7)
{TESSERA} – a word meaning being or existence inside an anagram (mobile) of ART

5d    Dirigible looks trendy (7)
{AIRSHIP} – a charade of some looks or bearings and an adjective meaning trendy

6d    Frank film director‘s salute to origins of realistic acting (5)
{CAPRA} – the surname of the director of It’s a Wonderful Life is derived from a verb meaning to salute by raising an item of headwear followed by the initial letters (origins) of Realistic Acting

7d    Repeat new ariette about the Queen (9)
{REITERATE} – an anagram (new) of ARIETTE around the Queen’s regnal cipher

10d    Travel league to lair and plunder Argonauts’ target (6,6)
{GOLDEN FLEECE} – a charade of a two-letter verb meaning to travel, L(eague), a lair and a verb meaning to plunder or rob

14d    Criminal mafia men run powerful computer (9)
{MAINFRAME} – I’ve worked on a few of these in my time! – an anagram (criminal) of MAFIA MEN R(un)

16d    Capone, for one, causing uproar always (9)
{RACKETEER} – a charade of an uproar and a poetic word for always

18d    Hail storm’s prevailing (7)
{AVERAGE} – a Latin greeting (hail) followed by a verb meaning to storm or fume

19d    Absolutely worst person possible is ridiculously pettish (3,4)
{THE PITS} – how John McEnroe addressed the umpire, spectators and reporters at Wimbledon is an anagram (ridiculously) of PETTISH

22d    Quickly stripping away top three parts of shell (5)
{APACE} – start with thick hard shell of the crab, tortoise, turtle, etc. and drop (stripping away) CAR (top three parts)

24d    American soldier rises to meet old friend (5)
{AMIGO} – AM(erican) followed by the reversal (rises in a down clue) of an (American) soldier and O(ld)

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Merry Christmas to all. If everything goes to plan I’ll be back with the Saturday Hints, if not it could be sooner!