"Good gracious, dad," I broke in. "It's nearly lunchtime" (6)
I believe the answer is:
midday
'nearly lunchtime' is the definition.
I can't tell whether this defines the answer.
'good gracious dad i broke in' is the wordplay.
'good gracious' becomes 'my' (both are exclamations of surprise. I am not sure about the 'good' bit.).
'broke' indicates anagramming the letters.
'in' is an insertion indicator.
'dad'+'i'='dadi'
'dadi' is an anagram of 'idda'.
'my' going around 'idda' is 'MIDDAY'.
'it's' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for midday that I've seen before include "Twelve noon" , "12 noon" , "time when hands are joined" , "12 o'clock in the day" , "1200 hours" .)