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...and hints large and small (*but not the THEME).

I’m already about to give up. Looks like very hard clues, and too many uncertainties, of added letters etc.
I have two of the perimeter answers, but can’t find an author linked to both.

Good Evening, Dylan. The wife's just bought me your lad Jakob's new album!

This is one for the A Listers I fear. Solved a third but a real slog. I don't normally come here for hints unless I am really struggling, but I suspect that I shall be having a look tomorrow afternoon.

So far the theme appears to be Google-proof. I have five of the perimeter entries and have worked out the nature of the thematic items from the hint (and some reverse engineering), but no combination of these, along with "writer died 2021" etc, produces any useful search results. The added letters don't seem to make any sense either although I haven't quite finished the grid fill so I'm hoping enlightenment will come, but that will have to wait until tomorrow. I'm way late for dinner!

So far this is a slog, but the puzzle's brilliance may become apparent on completion...

Loge, I am in exactly the same place as you. The 2 I haven't got are 36 and 1. For once google is proving to be extremely obstinate on both counts.

The theme is Google-proof.

Need to think a bit more laterally about the writer.

That’s the conclusion I came to CD. The PDM is either going to occasion a big bravo or a lot of swearing I think!

Well, neither bravo nor swearing. Given the subject, it would be churlish to be too rude about the puzzle, though I think this is very much an insider puzzle requiring specialist knowledge which many won't possess and won't be able to find easily online. I have "completed" it though I have no idea how the thematic items relate to the writer. I can make a guess what an apparently surplus two moved letters represent, though again I can find no confirmation.

Nice idea, but I think it should have been more accessible to those not in the know.

This one is too difficult for me (or I am in decline!). I find that I need to be able to do at least five clues on the first circuit to stand any chance of completing. This time I managed only two, both in the perimeter. Did anyone else find this extremely challenging?

I realise that you must have tough ones if the standard is to be maintained. I really enjoy the ones where the PDM is challenging (the raven recently was brilliant) but this was one where ht clues were super-hard. Best of luck to the A team

William - wouldn’t worry too much as this is pretty difficult.

I got lucky with making an educated guess about the theme and then even luckier making a stab at a few of the thematic items and then I still found it a real struggle to complete and still have a couple of parsing queries.

I don’t know the writer’s work well enough to know whether such a challenge is a fitting tribute but either way it’s a lovely way to commemorate someone’s life.

Thanks Gorrag.