Crossword Genius

Author and tense journalist: “What’s coming on Monday?” (9)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

thackeray

I'm a little stuck... Click here to teach me more about this clue!

'author' is the definition.
(I know that Thackeray is a author)

'tense journalist what's coming on monday?' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
'tense' could be 't' (grammatical abbreviation) and 't' is present in the answer.
'journalist' could be 'hack' (hack can informally mean a journalist) and 'hack' is found in the answer.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).

'and' is the link.

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for thackeray that I've seen before include "William Makepeace --, English novelist" , "Vanity Fair author" , "Pendennis author" , "writer" , "novel creator" .)

Want a hint initially instead of a full solution? Install my app