Toughie No. 16 — cryptic crossword

A toughie puzzle: 42 clues on a 15×15 grid. Solve it online — check your answers as you go, ask for a hint, and read how each clue works once it is solved.

Across

1. Paper is of great help when reset (9)
6. Grand total? What a nerve! (4)
9. Bend found in a solar cell (3)
10. Some bread in a slow oven is interlaced (5)
11. Vehicle paired off, becoming mechanised (9)
13. Try a short piece (5)
14. Ring for the drinks and give the orders (4,3,5)
15. Almost overexcited by all the publicity (4)
17. Sly ancients, sozzled, without a break (11)
20. Little person hiding on the shelf! (3)
22. Salesman coming back for each (3)
24. Below the stalls, one sees the point (11)
27. Incline to be thin (4)
29. Neat front, one that gives nothing away (8,4)
32. Resorts by the motorway give one a fit (5)
34. Free heart wandering in the life to come (9)
35. I bail out with an excuse (5)
36. Trendy up north, the local (3)
37. Toga torn by a butter (4)
38. Hesitation admitted in plans by those who draw them up (9)

Down

1. Borough bawler, an early news reader (4,5)
2. Flat either way you turn it! (5)
3. Chap absorbing energy, a cat-like creature (5)
4. A male ad rewritten for a Spanish promenade (7)
5. Small axe, the chat having broken down (7)
6. Green: windy, with a river running through (6)
7. Deeds of a cast at sea (4)
8. Young man and an unknown noblewoman (4)
9. Testy ham, upset, becomes a violet stone (8)
12. Painter's support when the lease is broken (5)
16. Quiet age for the farm hand (4)
18. Manage the vestment (4)
19. One who falls for the leading man (8)
21. Angler brings up a whale in the fishing grounds (9)
23. With ecstasy, run off! (5)
25. Conscripted daughter floated downriver (7)
26. Respects for the torn red rags (7)
28. Approval, by the sound of it, is an uphill struggle (6)
30. Sharp taste absorbing the west gives an accent (5)
31. Flavouring cooked up in Siena (5)
32. Sea bird chiefly seen hunting around Guernsey (4)
33. Air in part of Bavaria (4)

More: Toughie cryptic crosswords.

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