Next week my learned colleague Olivia will be doing the honours again while I move house, so none of my nonsense!
| Across | |
| 1 | Man from another planet intercepted by copper (6) |
| MARCUS - An easy one for Verlaine, perhaps? CU goes inside MARS. | |
| 5 | Worthless plane makers suffering setback — evidence of metal fatigue? (8) |
| GIMCRACK - Our usual Russian MIG is reversed, followed by a CRACK. | |
| 9 | Time of revolution finishing — grand for short time (8) |
| GERMINAL - TERMINAL has its T replaced by a G. | |
| 10 | Phone city in Alabama (6) |
| MOBILE - Double definition. Different pronunciations. | |
| 11 | Hard world where things can get very hot (6) |
| HEARTH - H(ard), EARTH. | |
| 12 | Threat to health, minute one found in time (8) |
| LISTERIA - LIST = minute, as in minute of a meeting; ERA has I inserted. | |
| 14 | Unease of party politician with nothing certain (12) |
| DISCOMPOSURE - DISCO = party, MP = politician, O SURE = nothing certain. | |
| 17 | One rogue's run off — “brainy” operator? (12) |
| NEUROSURGEON - (ONE ROGUES RUN)*. | |
| 20 | Lifelong publishing employee made fast progress (8) |
| CAREERED - CAREER = lifelong, as in 'career ambition'; ED in publishing. | |
| 22 | Youngster, said by Australian to be a chip off the old block? (6) |
| SHIVER - I'm not big on Oz speak, but my Australian seafaring uncle used to call me "The Shaver" when I was eight or nine, so I guess this is an Oz pronunciation of SHIVER as 'SHYVER' for shaver, and shiver is a synonym for a sliver or shard. | |
| 23 | Month seeing end of winter has sheep getting grass (6) |
| MARRAM - MAR(ch), RAM = sheep. Marram grass is that coarse stuff which grows on sand dunes. | |
| 25 | Cooking two fish to cover starter for dinner (8) |
| CODDLING - COD and LING have D(inner) inserted. | |
| 26 | Alarming changes on the border (8) |
| MARGINAL - (ALARMING)*. | |
| 27 | Revolutionary period involved in no end of vile execution by drowning (6) |
| NOYADE - DAY reversed inside NO (vil)E = no end of vile. From French noyer to drown, notably execution by said method as practised in the "Reign of Terror" at Nantes in 1793-4. | |
| Down | |
| 2 | Mountain features exist, appearing above ascending group (6) |
| ARETES - ARE = exist, TES = SET reversed. | |
| 3 | Friendship of dear America going awry (11) |
| CAMARADERIE - (DEAR AMERICA)*. | |
| 4 | Oddly saying academic work offers reconciliation of ideas? (9) |
| SYNTHESIS - S a Y i N g > SYN, THESIS = academic work. | |
| 5 | Miss one constellation as astronomer with primitive telescope (7) |
| GALILEO - Miss = GAL, I = one, LEO constellation. | |
| 6 | Notes a particular male going the wrong way (5) |
| MEMOS - SOME M reversed. | |
| 7 | Difficulty chipping end off stone (3) |
| RUB - RUB(Y). As in "aye, there's the rub" spoken by Hamlet. | |
| 8 | Underground workers using dogs to catch snooper finally (8) |
| COLLIERS - COLLIES dogs catch an R from end of snooper. | |
| 13 | Industrial German city — it upset colleague, by its very nature (11) |
| ESSENTIALLY - ESSEN on the Ruhr, IT reversed, ALLY = colleague. | |
| 15 | Journalists meeting knotty situation to the north kept going (7,2) |
| PRESSED ON - PRESS = journalists, NODE = knotty situation, reversed. | |
| 16 | Type of information encountered — notice a brief acknowledgement (8) |
| METADATA - MET = encountered, AD = notice, A, TA = brief thanks. | |
| 18 | A bitter uprising separating two sides on the left? (7) |
| RADICAL - R and L = two sides, insert A and ACID reversed. R (A DICA) L. | |
| 19 | Was monarch no good to be restricted? (6) |
| REINED - REIGNED loses its G = no good. | |
| 21 | Dish on Japanese menu? Head of restaurant has the final word (5) |
| RAMEN - r(estaurant), AMEN = final word.A Japanese dish with noodles in a broth. | |
| 24 | Charity event in tabloid? (3) |
| RAG - Double definition. | |
← Ctrl ← Alt
Ctrl → Alt →
← Ctrl ← Alt
Ctrl → Alt →