Sunday Toughie 236 (full review)

Sunday Toughie No 236 by Beam
Full Review by Gazza

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This puzzle was published on 02/08/26

Across Clues

1a Friendly, therefore guy protects single (8)
SOCIABLE: an adverb meaning therefore and the sort of guy used to hold up a tent contain the Roman single.

5a Sins left facing parts of church (6)
LAPSES: the abbreviation for left and recesses in a church.

9a Docile old criminal taking cut out (8)
OBEDIENT: the abbreviation for old and an informal adjective meaning criminal containing a verb to cut out or stop working.

10a  Sudden spring from black cat (6)
BOUNCE: the abbreviation for black and another term for the snow leopard.

12a  Welcome holding hands after a union (9)
AGREEMENT: a verb to welcome containing hands or workers follows A.

13a Sit back following ace storyteller (5)
AESOP: the reversal of a verb to sit (for a photo perhaps) follows the cards abbreviation for ace.

14a Emmerdale character regularly in farmhouse (4)
AMOS: the forename of a character from the TV soap Emmerdale can be seen as regular letters from ‘farmhouse’.

16a Chap’s embracing occasionally giddier girls (7)
MAIDENS:  another word for a chap plus the ‘S contains regular letters from ‘giddier’.

19a Grass keeping info back broke promises (7)
RENEGED: a type of grass contains the reversal of an informal term for information.

21a Coin is soundly cast (4)
CENT: a homophone of a past participle meaning cast or projected.

24a Shocks from electricity supply, we hear (5)
MANES:  a homophone of the word for the cables carrying our electricity supply. Shock here means hair.

25a Sycophant is more prostrate before Queen (9)
FLATTERER:  a comparative for more prostrate or more stretched out on the ground precedes the regnal cipher of our late Queen.

27a Large waves concerning for salt? (6)
SEASON: a word for large ocean waves and a preposition meaning concerning or about.

28a Unexpected stock issue? (8)
STAMPEDE: a cryptic definition – an uncontrolled rush of a group of horses or cattle.

29a Stick waste pipe around sink, finally (6)
SKEWER: a waste pipe contains the final letter of sink.

30a See about new exhaust? Absolutely! (8)
ENTIRELY: a see or diocese in Cambridgeshire contains the abbreviation for new and a verb to exhaust.

Down Clues

1d Labour with detailed motto (6)
SLOGAN: a conjunction meaning ‘with’ without its last letter follows a word for a spell of hard work.

2d         Covered in blubber, that woman’s red (6)
CHERRY: contained in a verb to blubber is a possessive pronoun for ‘that woman’.

3d Active US soldier with bitter exterior? (5)
AGILE: our usual abbreviated US soldier has outside it what bitter (as a drink) is a type of.

4d Underwear’s not namely stays (7)
LINGERS: start with a word for women’s underwear and add the ‘S then delete the abbreviation meaning namely or ‘that is’.

6d Love extremely accomplished rhetorical performance (9)
ADORATION: the letters at the extremes of ‘accomplished’ and a rhetorical performance or formal speech.

7d Wicked fault represents end, almost (8)
SINISTER: assemble a moral fault, a verb meaning represents and a synonym for an end without its last letter.

8d Ashamed, and second, rather ‘umble? (8)
SHEEPISH: the abbreviation for second followed by a whimsical adjective meaning in the manner of Uriah Heep (the character from David Copperfield who described himself as “so very ‘umble”).

11d Stop male under stone hugging sweetheart (4)
STEM: the abbreviation for male follows the abbreviation for stone with the two bracketing Beam’s usual swEetheart.

15d Rabbit to put in bare emporium (9)
MEGASTORE: a verb to rabbit or chatter and TO go inside a synonym of bare or trifling.

17d Sites with power casual about energy (8)
PREMISES: the abbreviation for power and an adjective meaning casual or slipshod containing the abbreviation for energy.

18d Overwhelm one sister over engagement (8)
INUNDATE: string together the Roman one, a religious sister and a romantic engagement.

20d Disregard of French family after vacation (4)
DEFY:  the French word for ‘of’ and the outer letters of ‘family’.

21d Caught with fly producing temper (7)
CHASTEN: the cricket abbreviation for caught and a verb to fly or go quickly. Temper is not the first synonym that springs to mind for the answer but it is in Chambers (as a verb).

22d       Sound of cool band round room (6)
FRIEZE: a homophone of a verb to cool significantly. There was some discussion on the Sunday as to whether the homophone applied to ‘cool’ or ‘band round room’ – it can only work one way because the homophone indicator (sound of) is adjacent to ‘cool’ and separated from ‘band round room’.

23d Charter yacht circling vessel (6)
ARTERY: hidden in the clue.

26d Times expressed musically, perhaps Italian initially? (5)
TEMPI: the first letters of five consecutive words in the clue.