The most common and most likely answer to this crossword clue is the 4 plus 5 letter word HARD TIMES
I've seen this crossword clue in The Guardian
H
A
R
D
T
I
M
E
S
More clues leading to the result HARD TIMES
- Firm multiplied by showing work of Dickens
- Novel, impenetrable, given to us
- Admits her changes required for novel
- Strong paper for book
- Possibly description of our crossword book
- Compact newspaper? That’s novel
- Fooled by absorbing Resistance story
- Novel had to contain right dates
- This dream conjured up in a novel
Buddy explains!
The straight part
We know that "story" is the straight/definition part of the clue. The straight part is often a synonym or definition, in this case story = hard times.The cryptic/wordplay part
In cryptic crossword there's often an wordplay/cryptic part as well.This part involves a more complex hint, such as an anagram, homophone, hidden word, etc.
Sadly, We don't have an explanation for this specific crossword clue yet.