Crossword Help Forum
Forum Rules

I would have agreed with you!
But Chambers gives "must" as "necessity".....
Collins says "to indicate necessity".....
And Bradford's Dictionary gives "must " as "need".....
So I guess we must/ need to accept that!

David: as other people have suggested 26A requires the use of an apostrophe; 5A the clue means 'move quickly' and the answer achieved by inserting a letter into a word to do with preventing stationary boats from moving about; I struggled with 8D too, mostly because I'd carelessly worked out my anagram for 11A and written in a more familiar form of the word. The clue means 'relatives'.
Overall, I found this puzzle 'steady', in other words, difficult but not so difficult that I didn't make progress. It took me an inordinate amount of time to get 15D, especially annoying as I've read the work in question. Perhaps, if I hadn't misspelled 18A (my COD) I wouldn't have taken so long.
But I have totally failed on 23A, despite resorting to electronic word searches. I can only think that I've got one of my crossers wrong but I'm sure of my first letter 'B' - confident of my middle 'A' and my final 'P' fits and parses in 20D.
No-one else seems to have mentioned this clue, so I assume that I'm missing something obvious, or have made, yet another, careless mistake.
BTW anyone care to parse 4D? The way it parallels 9D strongly suggests we have our regular setter, or perhaps, someone following a newly established 'house style'?

Sorry, Elle we must have crossed

Arib, the P in your 23 A is wrong.

Arib, I thought 4 D was a great clue - concise, fun and clever.

Good afternooon
I agree with Elle that 'must' and **** are synonymous nouns, but, I don't see them working as synonymous verbs.

Traffic lights and palm trees are a nuisance today

Hi Malone, agree 4d is excellent - another "less is more":-)

I'm sorry not to have commented sooner. I've been out doing the shopping.

I agree about 'must' and 'need (to)' being close when in the positive. But to my mind the negatives work differently. 'Mustn't' implies that an action is prohibited, while 'needn't' implies that an action is permitted but not necessary.

re my last post I should have put 'auxiliary verbs' but you get my drift, I hope !

I must admit (no pun intended), that I'm leaning towards David and Cerasus' point of view in regards 26a. The addition of 'Not' does seem to make a very big difference to the meaning to the words in question, and hence the definition.