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This week's puzzle is by Picaroon and, although I'm not very familiar with the different setters, I'm sure he/she is a regular for the Guardian.

I found this quite difficult but, as always, once it's been solved it's difficult to see what it was that caused the problems.

That said, a lot of the parsing is quite intricate, 20a for example. where you have to piece together five separate parts.

There is no particular theme that I could see but there seems to be a scientific bent to the puzzle. 17a for example, should please Chris, our resident chemist and I knew 27a from a lecture I attended at the Planetarium by Michio Kaku.

My FOI (First One In) was 2d, quickly followed by 22d and 23d.

I'm just re-reading Wolf Hall so was pleased to see 7d get a mention.

There is a long anagram if you get stuck but don't do what I did and dismiss the one answer the anagram solvers return - it is right!

COD (Clue Of the Day) lots of contenders, 13d, 7d and 14d but I'm going for the excellent 25a.

It's great that more and more new solvers our joining our friendly discussion thread each week, and if you get stuck, don't hesitate to ask for a hint, there are always people willing to help - you might be one of them:-)

Thanks to Picaroon for an excellent puzzle.

Stay safe:-)

Hi Brendan,
Picaroon is a regular setter and works to a high standard. He's been in outstanding form this year, seems to be much admired in the comments to daily Guardian puzzles.
On the difficult side but highly enjoyable. The Northwest quadrant was problematic for me. Most of the longer clues were really clever. On first pass, standouts were 3, 25 (FOI), 11 and 7. Many thanks to Picaroon.

Hi Geeker,

I thought I'd seen the name before and, judging by this puzzle, it's no wonder that Picaroon is so popular.

In 24a, is the definition stroke or strokes? I can fit only the second version, by dividing the answer as 1+3 letters.

Hi Mathi,

The definition is "stroke" and it's a 3 letter "sheep" reversed/"back" + the back of goaT.

Thanks, that fits!

Brendan,

Picaroon has been profiled in the Guardian's Meet the setter blog: https://www.theguardian.com/crosswords/crossword-blog/2014/nov/03/crossword-blog-meet-the-setter-picaroon
I only just now read it, missed out "in real time"...

Morning all,
That was definitely on the hard side but very enjoyable.
FOI was 10a followed by 17a. 20a is tricky, both the word and the parsing and 1a was LOI with the definition eluding me til the end. ‘More possibly’ also very well disguised.
3d is clever, I wonder if there’s a name for those sort of clues where the word itself is suggestive of a clue to a different word (if that makes sense).

On another note, reading the 225 blog for last week’s prize I didn’t pick up on the double wordplay in the clue for VISAGE, although I did wonder what ‘strange’ was doing there at the time. Very neat. Maybe it’s just me who didn’t spot it.

Have finally finished this. I have an answer to 21d which meets the definition of "sweet" but can't parse it for the life of me. Any hints welcome.
BTW, thanks to Brendan for spelling out crossword jargon abbreviations for the help of us newbies.

21d: last letter stands for ecstasy pill. First four letters are for red or a communist leader going upwards. I think this is the parsing.