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By Maskarade

Here’s an interactive grid for those who like me find it useful…

https://crossword.info/jono/Maskarade_Christmas_2025

The puzzle is in the paper only, though also accessible via PressReader.

All done and checked. An enjoyable way to spend part of a journey to the south of France in the back of a car, with even a couple of geographically topical clues thrown in.
Spent a long time thinking that Maskarade had mistakenly included two entries ending in an undefined S, before remembering that there was a different form of plural for one of them.
LOI 52 - obvious what it had to be but I didn’t know an element of the parsing.
COD? I did like 28.
Thanks to Maskarade for an entertaining challenge.

But no great thanks to the Guardian for printing the complete solution upside down on the same page!

Absolutely - folding it in half would have brought the bottom half of the solution fully into view. Somehow I managed to avert my eyes, but really!

I had the same problem as Rogerm re the colonnades ending - not helped by fact that most on-line dictionaries give the one that led me astray. Also had wrong poet for 37 and that confused me for a while in relation to another across clue. But sorted that. Thanks, Maskarade - it was enjoyable.

Thanks to folks at 225, got the grid and clues.
Completed.

Haven't parsed 20a.
17d, it has to be that, again, parsing is not clear.
63a 'a' vs 'o' issue?

Always admire Maskarade's setting, this no exception.
Thanks.

Some fun clues: 39, 15, 26, 36, 37, 32

15d, that is.

63a, someone has clarified that both spellings are ok.

Hi Ilippu,
The first word in the clue for 20a refers to a UK politician. The answer is a play on the short form of his first name.

The young lad in 17d is just a boys name (there’s a regular forum contributor here of the same name).