Want reform before midnight, in a manner of speaking (5)
I believe the answer is:
twang
'a manner of speaking' is the definition.
Although both the answer and definition are singular nouns, I can't understand how one could define the other.
'want reform before midnight' is the wordplay.
'reform' is an anagram indicator.
'before' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'midnight' becomes 'g' (the middle letter in 'night').
'want' is an anagram of 'twan'.
'twan'+'g'='TWANG'
'in' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for twang that I've seen before include "Noise made by a plucked string" , "Sharp vibrating sound" , "Plucking sound - nasal tone" , "Sound of plucked string (or certain dialects)" , "Pluck (a string)" .)