LAT Sun. 7/24 Caleb Rasmussen

[magus]

An Author Thing Coming

 
Music box?   CDCASE
Better part of a loaf?   HALF
Theme: Names of authors in phrases
People who recite “Jabberwocky” door-to-door?   CHRISTMASCARROLLERS
Fictional tornado shelter?   BAUMSHELTER [particularly apt in The Wizard of Oz]
Periods when Harry Potter books are unavailable?   ROWLINGBLACKOUTS
Not as hard to pronounce as some 17th-century poetry?  EASIERSAIDTHANDONNE

 
Crossing LEWIS and WILDE seems a bit unsporting since the clues are book titles.

 
Mystery writer John Dixon ___   CARR [Would “Today’s theme vehicle” work?]
Dashingly?   ATARUN [Isn’t the idiom “on a/the run”?]

 
Excellent server   ACER   [Another constructor who just looks at lists of clues rather than thinking --- or reading this space]

 
Stroked   SWAM [though one strokes during the process of swimming, the two are not synonymous]

The theme was so good that it overcomes the flaws.
RATING:    Three grins = Excellent: Loved it; Two grins = Good: Enjoyed it; One grin = Satisfactory: A bit bland for my taste; One teardrop = Unsatisfying: No fun

[cgrasmussen]

Thanks for the write-up.

Regarding ACER, I cringed when I found in an earlier post that there is a way in which that word should never be clued... and this puzzle was already on Rich's desk.