DT 29527

Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 29527

A full review by crypticsue

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This puzzle was published on 21^st November 2020

BD Rating – Difficulty * – Enjoyment ***

A pangram that reminded me of how Saturday Prize Puzzles used to be, and it turned out I was on the right lines, when long-time Saturday Prize Puzzle setter Cephas turned up to thank people for their comments

Please leave a comment telling us what you thought.

Across

1a    Soaked in fat (8)
DRIPPING – Double definition

9a    Series of balls with chum dancing an excessive amount (8)
OVERMUCH – OVER (series of cricket balls) with an anagram (dancing) of CHUM

10a    Athlete up at university? No, down! (4)
BLUE – An athlete representing Oxford or Cambridge Universities or a synonym for miserable (down)

11a    Type of finish in race that’s vivid? It’s to do with images (12)
PHOTOGRAPHIC – PHOTO (type of finish in race) GRAPHIC (vivid)

13a    Booming factory hides dope (8)
PLANGENT – PLANT (factory) ‘hides’ GEN (dope)

15a    Early summer, one could count on it (6)
ABACUS – An early piece of calculating apparatus

16a    Timothy denied concealing evil alter ego (4)
HYDE – Mr Jekyll’s evil alter ego is concealed in TimotHY DEnied

17a    Not likely to evaporate fast (5)
FIXED – Double definition

18a    Right direction? (4)
EAST – If you are facing north, this direction would be on your right

20a    It’s as broad as its long (6)
SQUARE – A cryptic definition of a particular shape

21a    Lawbreaker facing prison? A liberal one might allow such visits (8)
CONJUGAL – CON (lawbreaker) JUG (prison) A (from the clue) L (Liberal)

23a    Remarkably adept Patricia stopping short became involved (12)
PARTICIPATED – An anagram (remarkably) of ADEPT PATRICIa (stopping short telling you not to include the final letter)

26a    Not working whilst having some paid leave (4)
IDLE – Hidden in some paID LEave

27a    A bird in China coming from father’s side (8)
PATERNAL – A (from the clue) TERN (bird) inserted into PAL (China being cockney rhyming slang for friend)

28a    Hothouse‘s coloured lines (8)
ORANGERY – ORANGE (coloured) RY (railway lines)

Down

2d    Act with old student in show again (4-4)
ROLE-PLAY – O (old) L (learner, student) inserted into REPLAY (show again)

3d    Think about supporting new rep, worker being dominant (12)
PREPONDERANT – PONDER (think about) ‘supporting’ (in a Down solution) an anagram (new) of REP, ANT (worker) being added at the end

4d    Appeal to Kevin scrambling egg inside (6)
INVOKE – An anagram (scrambling) of KEVIN with an O (egg) inserted)

5d    Travel round wizard place, an island (4)
GOZO – GO (travel) ’round’ OZ (where the Wizard lived)

6d    Bring up one under care located astern (8)
REARWARD – REAR (bring up) WARD (one under care)

7d    Sprint from press, about to leave (4)
RUSH – C (about) to leave cRUSH (press)

8d    Brawny but not-so-clever group (8)
THICKSET – The not-so-clever group would be THICK SET

12d    After vegetables, start to eat sweet porridge? (5,7)
PEASE PUDDING – PEAS (vegetables) the ‘start’ to Eat and PUDDING (sweet)

14d    Poisonous beef consumed in short moment (5)
TOXIC – OX (beef) consumed in a TICk (truncated (short) moment)

16d    Bed-wetter? (8)
HOSEPIPE – A cryptic definition of something used to water a flower bed

17d    Charging exorbitantly for doing some work on the farm (8)
FLEECING – Sounds like the sort of work you might do on a sheep farm

19d    Odds on famous racehorse first to run? It might be seen in November (8)
SPARKLER – SP (starting price, odds) ARKLE (famous racehorse) R (the first letter of run)

22d    Head over valley to find animal (6)
NUTRIA – NUT (head) RIA (valley)

24d    Boring routine hard for lady (4)
RUTH – RUT (boring routine) H (hard)

25d    Game explorer (4)
POLO – And another double definition to finish