Toughie 3375 – Big Dave's Crossword Blog
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Toughie 3375

by Gazza  

Toughie No 3375 by Beam
Hints and tips by Gazza

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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment ***

It’s Beam regular monthly outing – enjoyable as ever with the main problem being questions along the lines of ‘how does x mean y?’. Thanks to him.

Please leave a comment telling us how you fared and what you liked about the puzzle.

Across Clues

1a See romance over quick, taking seconds (10)
EPISCOPACY: string together a romance or heroic story, the cricket abbreviation for over and a synonym of quick then insert the abbreviation for seconds.

6a Exhausted and occasionally unsteady (4)
USED: occasional letters from the final word.

10a Capital of Venezuela? (7)
CENTIMO: one hundredth of a bolivar.

11a Strong old con facing endless stir (7)
ODOROUS: assemble the abbreviation for old, a verb to con or swindle and a verb to stir without its last letter.

12a Pure force gripping can (8)
PRISTINE: a verb to force or wrench contains a metal can.

13a Finale of song in dreadful lament (5)
DIRGE: insert the final letter of song into a synonym of dreadful.

15a Uncontrolled aircraft’s nose stuck in airstrip (7)
RUNAWAY: the leading letter of aircraft goes inside another word for an airstrip.

17a A star rose, turning up (7)
ASUNDER: weld together A, our very own star and the reversal of rose(-coloured). I presume that ‘up’ means the answer as in ‘torn up’.

19a River bore is most profound (7)
DEEPEST: one of Crosswordland’s favourite rivers and a word for a bore or pain in the neck.

21a Pale following motorway accident (7)
MISTAKE: a pale or wooden post follows the Leeds-London motorway.

22a Dump Sun’s first poor journalist (5)
SHACK: the first letter of sun and an informal word for a poor journalist.

24a Bond part involves M’s predecessor? (8)
RELATION: a synonym of a part or allotment contains the spelled-out letter that precedes M.

27a Lively perfect sweetheart with cut flower (7)
ALLEGRO: cement together a synonym of perfect or complete, Beam’s usual swEetheart and a verb to flower or bloom without its last letter.

28a Former nobleman before single Queen (7)
EARLIER: a nobleman precedes the letter that resembles one and our late Queen’s cipher.

29a A bit backward displaying intelligence (4)
DATA: reverse A and a word for a bit or small amount.

30a Union accepts Greece rejected empty duty (10)
ALLEGIANCE: a synonym of union or coalition contains the reversal of the outer letters of Greece.

Down Clues

1d Every single seashore is topless (4)
EACH: a seashore minus its top letter.

2d Stupidity of design or ancestry (9)
IGNORANCE: hidden.

3d Counters held in poker, say, initially (5)
CHIPS: initial letters.

4d Shame pinching loot showing honesty (7)
PROBITY: a synonym of shame (as in ‘what a shame!’) containing a verb to loot.

5d Catch, say, a severe infection (7)
CHOLERA: a homophone of an informal verb to catch or arrest and A.

7d Succeeded going over stony trail (5)
SPOOR: the genealogical abbreviation for succeeded and an adjective meaning stony or hard up.

8d Crush pepper finally into food consumed (10)
DISHEARTEN: a synonym of food and a past participle meaning consumed into which the final letter of pepper is inserted.

9d Beat’s incorporating vintage blues (8)
DOLDRUMS: a synonym of beat or pounding with the ‘S contains a synonym of vintage or dated.

14d Wedding guest annoys mother in charge (10)
BRIDESMAID: insert a verb meaning annoys or badgers and an affectionate word for mother into a verb meaning charge or instruct.

16d From salary about hundred grand remains (8)
WRECKAGE: a synonym of salary containing a prefix meaning about, the Roman numeral for a hundred and the symbol for a grand or thousand. Unless I’m missing something (it wouldn’t be unusual) this doesn’t work – ‘about’ is being used as both a containment indicator and part of the wordplay.

18d Severe new fine? Zero bill rises (9)
DRACONIAN: rivet together the abbreviation for new, an abbreviation meaning fine, and (2,4) a phrase meaning zero bill or list of performers. Now reverse the lot.

20d Chaos from Labour holding quorum periodically (7)
TURMOIL: a verb to labour contains regular letters from quorum.

21d French writer is longer penning story (7)
MOLIÈRE: a word meaning longer or extra contains an untrue story. The name of this dramatist brought back memories of A-level French.

23d Budget seeing a tax raised (5)
ALLOT: A and the reversal of a tax or charge.

25d Trunks somewhat soft or silky (5)
TORSI: hidden.

26d Unconstrained Republican in charge (4)
FREE: the abbreviation for Republican is contained in a monetary charge.

The clues that I liked best were 5d and 8d. Which one(s) did the business for you?

 

22 comments on “Toughie 3375”

  1. I think 16d is ok as “from”, to me, implies within.

    Some of this was easier to solve than to parse.
    5d was my last in, and my favourite.

    Thanks to Beam and to Gazza.
    3*/4*

              1. It is unusual but in the DT cryptic over the years I have seen plenty of this type of double duty. So I think wage around (re c k) is fair enough

  2. The elegant and refined fortnightly Beam puzzle we have come to anticipate and enjoy. I did think that 10a was only just about cryptic, and while it works would certainly not put 11a in my top 10 synonyms of strong. Highlights for me were 16d, 5d and 4d.

    Many thanks indeed to Beam and to Gazza – thank you for continually searching out such wonderful cartoons!

  3. Terrific fun as always from Mr T with his usual accurate and concise wordplay. The intricacy of some of the parsing held me up a tad, but this was a very worthwhile and enjoyable challenge. 24a together with 5 and 8d make it onto the podium.

    Thanks to Beam and Gazza.

  4. I found this tougher than usual for a Beam Toughie but, apart from struggling to parse 16d, it was as enjoyable as ever.

    I’m consoled that it turns out that I was not alone in being unable to justify the wordplay for 16d.

    5d was my favourite.

    Many thanks to Beam and to Gazza.

  5. Another pedestrian solve. I found it trickier than usual for a Beam Toughie but then my crossword brain (such as it is) is malfunctioning at present – as evidenced by the embarrassingly long time spent pondering precisely where to stick my R in the food consumed. It was my fav for the d’oh moment with podium places for 5&9d. Also liked 1a & the 24a surface.
    Thanks to Beam & to Gazza – loved the 1d cartoon.

  7. A tricky Toughie, but no complaints from me.
    I thought 2d was a very well concealed hidden word and like others, suspect that we need more than one “about” in 16d.
    Thank you RayT and Gazza. Great cartoons, as ever!

  8. I made hard work of this particularly in the East where I rather ground to a halt. I managed to get going again by solving 9d. Needed the hints to parse a few. I enjoyed the challenge though. Hard to pick a favourite but I’ll go with 5d. Thanks to Beam and Gazza.

  9. As is usual for Beam we have a concise and enjoyable Toughie. I do have a problem though with 17A meaning ” up.”
    Favourites for me were 5D and 7D.
    Many thanks to Gazza for the blog and amusement and to Beam.

  10. Evening all. thanks to Gazza for the analysis and to all who commented. Quite right about 16d!

    RayT

  11. Very late reporting in, it’s been a ‘hospital appointments day’ and we all know how long those can take!
    I was definitely in the ‘how does x=y’ camp on several occasions with this one and it made me laugh to discover that one of the clues which I awarded a big tick to – 16d – apparently doesn’t quite work……. The other one I really liked was 5d which seems to have been OK with everyone, thank goodness.

    Devotions to Mr T/Beam and many thanks to Gazza for the review and cartoons – the one illustrating 1a took my prize today.

  12. Started with 1a which was fun to unpick and the fun continued through the rest of the solve.
    Thanks Beam and Gazza

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