ENGLISH CRIME STORIES FOR A WINTER NIGHT
England is a small country, but the variety of landscapes is endless and the landscape sculpts the character of the people whose families have lived there for generations. There are the
counties on the edge where the rest of the world doesn’t pass through. The only reason to go there is if it’s your destination, whether for holiday or work and that creates a close-knit
community. There are two of those in the books I’ve chosen.
Norfolk is flat with huge skies, the sea and a wonderful light that makes it a favourite with artists. Cornwall, like Norfolk has been all about farming, fishing and, historically, smuggling
for the local inhabitants and was the much loved home of Daphne du Maurier. These days the glorious rocky coast attracts holiday makers by the hundreds of thousands to its surfing
beaches.
Kent has a much softer landscape. It’s the “garden of England”, and famous for its hop gardens and oast houses where they were dried to make beer for the iconic English public
houses which feature in the story I’ve chosen, along with another British tradition, the Christmas pantomime. It also has a large coastline and is the route into France whether by ferry or through the channel tunnel.
Cumbria is mountainous sheep-country. Famous for its lakes, it was the home of Beatrix Potter who used the money she made from her books to buy hundreds to acres to protect and
gift to the National Trust. And finally there is Hertfordshire, north of London, with Roman St Albans, and the film studio where the first three Star War movies were made.
Come and take a murder mystery tour of England with books to curl up with on a cold winter’s night.
THE THREE DAHLIAS by Katy Watson
The Three Dahlias by Katy Watson, is a homage to the golden age of detective fiction and this year was chosen as Thriller of the Month by Waterstones, the largest bookstore chain in Britain. The setting is Aldermere, in Hertfordshire, the home of the late Lettice Davenport, who wrote the Dahlia Lively crime novels. There is to be a new television adaptation and fans have been invited to a convention to meet two actress who have already played the role on screen, and the former child-star who has been cast as Dahlia for the new series. Inevitably there is tension between the three women.
At the end of the first set piece event, a dinner recreated from one of the books at which someone is poisoned (asking for trouble!) one of the guests is dead. Faced with a real life murder the three Dahlias ask themselves, “What would Dahlia do?” and the answer is to take on the role for real and hunt for the killer using clues from Lettice’s books.
Beautifully written and enormous fun, you couldn’t ask for anything more English.
THE CURATOR by M W Craven
Craven’s Washington Poe series, set in Cumbria, in the north west of England, has the additional joy of one of the most original and engaging female sidekicks in Tilly Bradshaw. The books are a series and there are ongoing threads, but nothing that gets in the way of a great stand-alone crime novel.
The writing is pacy, the action non-stop and I chose this one because it has a winter setting in what is a stunning but always challenging landscape.
The Curator begins with the discovery of three pairs of fingers – one cut from the victims while alive, the other when dead. There’s a vile game afoot, with international connections. Nothing is as it seems. The killer is playing psychological mind games with police, but with each new twist the story goes to deeper until the truly shocking ending feels like a series of body blows.
AGATHA CHRISTIE by Lucy Worsley
This isn’t fiction, but Lucy Worsley’s wonderful new biography of Agatha Christie is a must have for the library of all lovers of her work. Worsley is an enthusiastic narrator of a long and productive life, with a deep knowledge of the books – there is a terrific television programme to accompany the book.
Worsley presents Agatha Christie as a woman living a modern life while doing her best to appear ordinary. She was very far from that. I loved the fact that in age when the patriarchy ruled, the house she bought with the money she earned from her writing had her name on the deeds. Only her name. I don’t imagine Archie Christie would have liked that much. And how, after her breakdown following her husband’s adultery and their divorce, she picked herself up and travelled alone to the Middle East where she found inspiration for some of her best known books. The first book of hers that I read when very young, was Murder in
Mesopotamia. One of the murder scenes has never left me.
THE CROSSING PLACES by Elly Griffiths
The Crossing Places is the first book in the best-selling Ruth Galloway Mysteries by Elly Griffiths. Dr Ruth Galloway is a university professor and her field is forensic archaeology. She’s called in as a consultant by DCI Harry Nelson when a child’s bones are discovered near a prehistoric site on the north Norfolk salt marshes.
Are they the remains of a local girl who disappeared ten years earlier? Nelson has been getting sinister notes about ritual sacrifice since she vanished and he needs Ruth’s expertise to solve this case. Then a second child goes missing.
There’s a mysterious henge uncovered on a beach and the world of this book is steeped in the mystical liminal space between land and sea. Set in Norfolk, on the east coast of England, with its wide skies and the ever-present sea, the landscape is a character in its own right.
MURDER BY CHRISTMAS by Lesley Cookman
Murder by Christmas, set in the village of Steeple Martin in Kent, close to the sea and the city of Canterbury, is the latest in the long running Libby Sarjeant series. Libby and her friend Fran have been falling over bodies and getting under the feet of DCI Ian Connell as they get to the bottom of some shocking murders for quite a while.
Christmas sees no let up in the body count. Libby is deep into rehearsals for the annual Christmas pantomime – it’s Cinderella this year and Libby has not only written it but is directing and playing the fairy godmother. Plus there’s Christmas to organise. But when, two weeks before the holiday, a body is found in a doorway, Libby and Fran are once more called into action.
Their investigations lead them to a local brewery and Libby and Fran gather a team of local
publicans to unravel a case as English as a yard of ale.
THE DEAD OF WINTER by Nicola Upson
Nicola Upson’s wonderful book is set in Cornwall, at the castle on St Michael’s Mount. It’s the year before the second world war and a grand charity Christmas celebration is being held to raise money in aid of Jewish children being rescued from Nazi Germany.
The guests include a Nazi harried Marlene Dietrich, with Scotland Yard detective, Archie Penrose, at her side charged with keeping her safe. There’s the famous crime writer and playwright, Josephine Tey and her screenwriting partner. A photographer is along to capture the event for a newspaper that has pledged £10,000 to the charity, the former vicar of the church on the Mount and his wife, a Nazi sympathizer and one other couple who seem oddly out of place.
The Mount can only be reached by a causeway twice a day, or by boat. A storm closes in cutting off the causeway and making it too dangerous for a boat crossing and three people are left stranded on the mainland. And then one of the guests meets a brutal end. When a second body is discovered and with the phone line down, Archie Penrose is forced into a life-risking attempt to get help.
This has all the hallmarks of a golden age country house mystery. Perfect fireside reading.
