2558: Blonde, 78

Unclued lights can be grouped into three triplets, each associated in a different sense with a keyword to be discovered, of which the title suggests a topical example

Across

7 Assembly line described by writer I don’t know (6)

12 Smaller flower is rarity, but gets propagated (9)

13 Dido laughed, admitting mistaken views (5)

15 Magic as hospital overcomes shortage (9, two words)

16 Buttress, stone, penetrated by Edmund (6)

20 Celebrate about weed doing farrier’s work (7)

21 Do a Chinese for Mormon perhaps (6)

24 Loose women once simpered stupidly (8)

26 One terrible noise echoing from nests (4)

Most popular

Samuel Gregg

The welcome fall of Klaus Schwab

27 One can’t write in this good book (3)

29 One studying Rabbit, Run (4)

32 With restraint, watched massacre filmed (8)

34 Backward American state becomes more sophisticated (6)

35 Salt he sprinkled around meat loaf (6)

37 On high tower, note foreign character (7)

39 Available for work, only half attracting tax (6, two words)

42 What I balanced precariously on head? (9, two words)

45 Tower, we hear, is a beautiful sight (6)

46 Male Scot’s purpose shows courage (6)

Down

1 Little darlings turned up, having rung (4)

2 Holiday on ship fitted with one iron lamp (7)

3 Virus met with drug in workers’ colony (4)

4 In greater numbers go round and tell us off (7)

6 No open country offers shade (6)

8 A positive response, as it were (4)

10 Extreme cult raided, half expelled (5)

11 First to mention ransom, ask criminal for ID set in stone (10, two words)

17 Up-country, fail to find milk drink (6)

18 After fish, pair eating plain biscuit (9)

19 Frustrate recording fixer (10, two words)

23 Discharges European over old exploits (6)

25 Notice about a trim knot, perhaps (8, hyphened)

26 A copper first seen on D-Day (8, two words)

30 As fever remedy, endlessly pound square (7)

33 Expert with this, tend to melt, becoming infatuated (6, two words)

36 American? In the south, you come over as calm (5)

38 Super, heading off to fly around then land (4)

40 One turn and tilt only needed occasionally (4)

41 Horrid beast in yard given drink (4)

A first prize of £30 for the first correct solution opened on 20 June.