Criminally Good Days Out…
Post Easter blues, the effects of eating too much chocolate, back to work, reeling over that Broadchurch reveal…….no wonder everyone’s a little tired today. So, what about a postcard snapshot of some cracking mysteries to chew over?
So what could fill the gap left by no chocolate and Broadchurch?
What about Oysters in Whitstable?
There’s something fishy going on in Whitstable and in the first book in the series an Oyster fisherman is found dead. What happens next takes you in and around the cobbled, twisty streets of Whitstable with place names such as Squeeze Gut Alley adding a real seaside flavour to proceedings. It might sound like ‘cosy crime’ but there’s a lot of layers to this book and lots of suspects and doubt early on. It got me really sucked in very early on and it was a real reading escape. Wait till you meet Dolly! Haha every seaside town should have one.
The colours of this novel really did remind me of Broadchurch with those cliffs, the seaside sights and aromas and the small inward looking community.
How about a theatre show in Harrogate?
This is just one of the mysteries written by the lovely Frances Brody and it’s still one of my favourites. Set in Harrogate, the home of Theakstons Crime festival and where Agatha Christie herself disappeared to once and stayed in secret at the local Old Swan Hotel, this town has an added sense of intrigue about it. The theatre featured on the cover is just as it appears in real life – an impression of the past and town that time has somehow forgotten in places – leaving a vintage charm of its own.
If you’re hungry, the world famous Betty’s Tea Rooms are here so you can eat a cake whilst following the trails of clues around the picturesque town. With its village feel, all you need to do is to buy a hat like Kate Shackleton and get hunting for those clues!
Fancy a hot air balloon ride over the Northumberland hills?
The opening chapter alone is worthy of a Broadchurch style episode. It’s quite a premise – people in a hot air balloon see a crime being committed down below. The criminal sees the face of one of the women clearly and she is the only one to survive…The chase for clues and the hidden suspects in plain sight have you running around those Northumberland hills as fast as your little legs will take you. This is heartstopping, full of OMG moments and a lot of interesting historical backstory – there is a pilgrim’s walk from Melrose on the Scottish Borders to Lindisfarne on Holy Island cleverly woven into the idea of someone on a trail looking for something and getting a bit lost in the process. Apt especially for the fact that there are several nuns in this story and their path is far from clear…
Spend awhile hiding out in Clogherhead
Spending a while in a remote part of Ireland might sound nice but when Cally Taylor’s your guide, you just know that this is not going to be any kind of holiday. A woman on the run, a marriage in trouble and many secrets buried in the past…As you run you have to stay hidden and with a small child that is no easy task. Cally Taylor’s books are always fraught with mystery,intrigue, suspense and outright fear. But that’s what makes them so gripping and real. Characters you could and probably have come across in your own life adds to that realisation that these things could happen and that no one is really as they seem. There are lots of twists, turns and red herrings in this book as well as her others so will fill a reading hole AND get you craving more Cally Taylor novels instead of chocolate.
And of course – The Broadchurch BookTrail
