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Toughie No. 39 — cryptic crossword

A toughie puzzle: 44 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. Defeated campaign becomes a hopeless case (4,5)
  2. Suppress question with posh measure (5)
  3. Prim hut converted into a great success (7)
  4. Decider: drama that is cancelled (4,3)
  5. Brazilian dance for boy with degree (5)
  6. Flip, faint and unhinged: the one bringing a case (9)
  7. Suitable to run into (4)
  8. Opener when nitro goes off (5)
  9. Time inside for a feathered friend (4)
  10. Sharp pull from an American (4)
  11. Refusal turned back before the church, long ago (4)
  12. A lot arranged for the singer (4)
  13. One performing in the arts! (4)
  14. Chopped up, losing the top, and chilled (4)
  15. Wait above the motorway, as a kestrel might (5)
  16. Mark, part of disc artwork (4)
  17. Arrangement of data when not at home (9)
  18. Composition, we hear, is a trial (5)
  19. Cut, sunk and wrecked! (7)
  20. Trimmed badly at the middle of the course (7)
  21. Ivories buried in the great Usk stream (5)
  22. Send yells echoing on and on (9)

Down

  1. Bloom cultivated by louts (5)
  2. Shine faintly, more nervous about two thousand (7)
  3. Action seen in dotcom battles (6)
  4. Disgruntled one abroad is content (7)
  5. Former partner is simple to interpret (7)
  6. Punt pole holding one, how picturesque (6)
  7. Ecstasy over proposal shows feeling (7)
  8. Gone, the runners from an unexpected quarter (4,5)
  9. French friend, amiable but not able (3)
  10. Editor caught up in brush, where one sleeps (7)
  11. Pen contents found in Berlin kiosk (3)
  12. Where it is hot, right in among subjects (7)
  13. Carry produce and come good (4,5)
  14. Truths distorted in a second, giving sharp pushes (7)
  15. Group ready to harden (3)
  16. Run slowly, as river enters to amuse (7)
  17. Meander wildly, given a new title (7)
  18. Caught washes churning — nuts (7)
  19. Leaders of European Renaissance Art in this period (3)
  20. Valleys taking in university principles (6)
  21. Small muddle makes a burden (6)
  22. Unknown, with hesitation and goodness, is delicious (5)

More: Toughie cryptic crosswords.

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