Paull Tickner
Victor Moussa/Shutterstock.comIn Volume 1, I highlighted the International Agatha Christie Festival, still scheduled for 12th-15th September and it set me thinking about other murder mystery novels your clients might have read, have on their bookshelf or watched spell-bound on Masterpiece. With a bit of imagination, we can turn much-loved fiction into touchable reality.
Morse, Lewis and Endeavour
The Eagle and Child Pub – Spiroview, Inc/Shutterstock.comNinety minutes from Southampton and about the same from London Heathrow, base yourself in the university city of Oxford and discover the sites where the filming took place, from the world-famous Bodleian Library including Hogwarts Library aka Duke Humfrey’s Library to the quads of the university Colleges, with the dark narrow and winding alleyways in between leading to the public houses where the famous words ‘Pint, Lewis?’ were often spoken. Plan to have a pub lunch at the Eagle and Child, nicknamed the Bird and Baby, the meeting place for the Inklings writers’ group which included J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis.
Midsomer Murders
This corpse-strewn hit drama has become a worldwide phenomenon and we should add the unflappable Inspector Barnaby to the list of great detectives. Most of the series locations can be found amidst the thatched cottages, Norman churches, pretty villages across Buckinghamshire and The Chilterns. In Midsomer County, the home of traditional pubs, village greens, fetes and Sunday afternoon cricket, you can learn the history behind the picturesque settings of this famous and much-loved programme.
Dick Francis and Grantchester
The Warren Hill racehorse training gallops at Newmarket – cornfield/Shutterstock.comBased yourself for a couple of nights in the university city of Cambridge, you should spend a day discovering Newmarket, the birthplace and home of horse racing and inspiration for many of Dick Francis’ best-selling novels. You should also set aside some time for visits to Grantchester, the small south of Cambridgeshire village where James Runcie set his books The Grantchester Mysteries. It was the location for the popular TV series of the same name and home to the inquisitive vicar Sydney Chambers and the gruff, down-to-earth police inspector Geordie Keating.
Father Brown and Agatha Raisin
Set in the early 1950s, Father Brown is based on the stories by G.K. Chesterton in the fictional village of Kembleford where Father Brown is the priest at St. Mary’s Church. Over a two-day period, you can visit churches, hospitals, pubs and police stations used in the series. Chipping Campden, Broadway and Stow on the Wold clearly feature in M.C. Beaton’s popular novels and Father Brown is filmed in the village where she lived. Turn fiction into on location reality with visits to one or two of her favourite pubs, tea rooms and pubs.
It’s Elementary My Dear Watson
Sherlock Holmes statue outside Baker Street underground station, London – Alex Segre/Shutterstock.comAny Sherlock Holmes tour must spend a couple of days visiting London locations used in the many different adaptations before heading for Salisbury, pausing at the 12th century St. Peter’s Church, Minstead where Sir Arthur is buried. You might also like to detour through St Mary Mead aka Nether Wallop, the quaint fictional village created by Agatha Christie as the idyllic setting for her first novel, “The Murder at the Vicarage” before reaching Bristol where they have created a tour that reveals the locations used in the recent BBC Sherlock series starring Benedict Cumberbatch. London, Salisbury, Bath, Bristol, Oxford and back to London—don’t you feel a tour coming on?
Crusader, Monk, Detective
Abbey Church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, Shrewsbury, Shropshire, England – Caron Badkin/Shutterstock.comA few years ago, Masterpiece successfully screened Ellis Peter’s best-selling medieval whodunnits solved by Brother Cadfael, played by Derek Jacobi, the crusader turned herbalist monk detective who lived in the Welsh border county of Shropshire. Today you can visit Shrewsbury Abbey where he lived and discover the castles, abbeys, picturesque villages and towns that vividly capture his life and times.
Rub Shoulders With the Authors
For real fans wanting to rub shoulders with some of their favourite writers, I can thoroughly recommend two outstanding literary festivals which, although cancelled for this year, should take place once again in 2021.
CrimeFest takes place in Bristol in late May/early June and just as the Chelsea Flower Show is the must-see event for amateur and professional gardeners, this is a convention for people who like to read an occasional crime novel as well as for die-hard fanatics. Since its inception in 2008, it has not only become one of the biggest crime fiction events in Europe but is also one of the most popular dates in the international crime fiction calendar.
Towards the end of July, the world class, award winning Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival is an event not to be missed. Celebrating the very best in crime fiction and with an incredible line-up of special guests and a variety of fresh and exciting panels, the festival is a firm date in the literary calendar, and it has achieved international acclaim for the programming, organization and atmosphere. Harlan Coben, Jo Nesbo and James Patterson were there last year, along with a long list of internationally renowned authors.
Paull Tickner, owner of U.K-based Custom GB, is known for his expertise in creating and operating imaginative, value-added tours of Great Britain and Ireland. Visit his website at www.customgb.co.uk or email ptickner@customgb.co.uk.
