Crossword Help Forum
Forum Rules

38d is pretty awful, don’t like head as intelligence or water as excellence.

Not a fan of wraith meaning shade either in 29a.

I guessed Watson’s colleague in 32d was Cric(k) - losing the k for
potassium, but still can’t parse the answer (not helped because I’ve never heard of the word ‘creatic’).

Still not sure that 55a needs the word ‘American’.

Couple more.

45a Most risky district French company’s invested in (7)
Diciest?

25d Class diversity in music-hall entertainment (7)
Variety. But what’s the word ‘class’ doing in the clue? It doesn’t seem needed.

38d I found the following definition of 'water' in the Google dictionary:
"the quality of transparency and brilliance shown by a diamond or other gem". Is this any better?

32d CR(EAT)IC. Eat being 'to have a bite'.

55a Could it be a reference to 'Uncle Tom' in keeping with the slavery theme? I agree that it's not necessary.

45a Apparently 'Cie' is the French abbreviation for compagnie. Dist. will then be the abbreviation for district.

25d Could 'class diversity' be a biology term for variety within a class? You probably still don't need the word 'class' though so I'm not being much help here!

I agree that there's some pretty contorted clues this week! The one I'm really struggling to parse is:

30D Male with natural head for cruelty (13)

H _ A _ T _ E _ S _ E _ S

I'm thinking it can only be HEARTLESSNESS, and which can mean cruelty. But aside from 'ness' being a 'head' I can't understand the rest of the clue at all.

Can anyone put me out of my misery?

I think the He is 'male', the artless is 'natural ' and the Ness is' head'.

HE - male
ARTLESS - natural

Aagh! Why didn't I see that?? Thank you Chrise and Malone.