BARE BONES

WIN A COLLINS ENGLISH DICTIONARY AND THESAURUS SET, AND A BRADFORD’S CROSSWORD SOLVER’S DICTIONARY

Our Bare Bones Crossword is unique because you have to complete the grid – numbers and squares – as well. We have inserted four black squares and four clue numbers to get you going. The crossword has a fourway symmetry: both top and bottom and left and right match, so you can fill in 12 more squares straight away.

There is a prize of a Collins English Dictionary and Thesaurus set, and a Bradford’s Crossword Solver’s Dictionary. Send your solution to: Bare Bones Puzzle No 980, The Mail on Sunday, PO Box 3451, Norwich NR7 7NR. Entries must arrive by Friday, January 29 (photocopies not accepted). The winner’s name will be published on February 14 from the first correct entry drawn. Winner of Bare Bones No 977: Simon Plummer, of Radford, Coventry.

Across

1 Big impression made by bad diver 4 Plan a series of lectures 9 Enduring final gin cocktail 12 Jack is name, strangely, for a woman 14 Are back for a long time 15 Secretive, not starting? Quite the reverse 16 Virginia takes cover that’s acceptable 17 New route getting silver causes indignation 18 Piece gets registered as seafood 20 Composer on doctrine about musical form 22 Fabled bird in frock 23 Song with end about King Minos’s daughter 25 Backwards artist set stall out first – no nonentities (Two words, hyphenated) 27 All right, include it, but with limits 28 Consented to a vice

Down

2 I step out, having cold inclination 3 Crooned endlessly about Polaris, say 5 Removal includes eggs 6 Knock over small tablet 7 Organise poll for a new map (Two words) 8 Top directors in part of bed 10 Recited at home, getting well-defined muscles 11 Greets wildly, including universal sign 12 Preserve spies returning to a Caribbean island 13 Quite a few cut by a laser, initially 19 A party needs one excuse 21 Saltpetre starts to nestle in the reclining end 24 Snitched about fool 26 Insulate a prisoner