Fulfil your fantasy of playing detective for a day
You read the thrillers, watch the TV crime series. Now you can...
Just a few metres away, children play happily on the grass while tourists throw bread to swans on the lake.
It seems to be a quiet afternoon in Kensington Gardens. But I can’t be distracted — I’m hot on the heels of a killer.
I’m on a murder mystery-themed trail, a growing trend as more and more of us indulge our passion for crime fiction and attempt to turn Miss Marple.
these days a whole host of ingenious new ways take our passion for solving mysteries out of the pages of books and into real life. And no wonder. Crime was recently declared the country’s favourite book genre for the first time, with 18.7million crime and thriller books sold in the uK last year, according to Nielsen Bookscan, which measures sales.
Females account for close to 60 per cent of sales last year, and women aged 45 and up are the biggest fans.
Why are we so obsessed? One theory is that it’s the satisfaction of seeing evil routed — it’s no coincidence the golden age of detective fiction fell between the wars, as Britain hungered for calm.
It has been suggested, too, that women, conditioned to imagine the worst, find comfort in seeing fears explored in print. Or, more cheerfully, there is the joy of identifying the culprit: women are four times more likely than men to be compulsive puzzle players, one study found.
Our enthusiasm for crime is already reflected on screen: John Malkovich is the latest star to play Hercule Poirot in the ABC Murders, expected to air on the BBC late this year, while female tV detectives include sarah Lancashire in Happy Valley and Anna Friel in Marcella. And now there are far more ways to find out whodunit . . .
Play Cluedo in real-life
Put your sleuthing skills to the test with Cluedupp, a game that turns the streets of towns across Britain into a ‘giant, interactive Cluedo board’.
On a designated day in a chosen town or city, teams race to eliminate suspects, with GPs tracking on their phones unlocking the next clue when they reach the correct spot (for example, a witness statement might pop up on the app).
Founder tref Griffiths notes the game’s demographic is 80 per cent female. ‘Players are a bit more evenly spread, but it’s definitely women doing the buying and getting excited,’ he says.
Over the weekend, 300 teams of six gathered in Glasgow for the biggest Cluedupp game yet. upcoming locations include Leeds, sheffield, Nottingham, Birmingham and Oxford (£30 a team, cluedupp.com).
If you’d like to wear out a little less shoe leather, the forensically minded can follow a trail laid around the Natural History Museum in London for Crime scene Live. Here you can analyse fingerprints with real-life police officers or decode blood spatter patterns to solve a fictional crime.
(Next event is on June 25, tickets £63, £56.70 for members, nhm. ac.uk/events/crime-scene-live.)
Get on a killer’s trail
As AN alternative to group events, which must be played on specific days, treasure trails up and down the country allow you to crack a crime in your own time.
On the treasure trails website, search your location to find a murder mystery walk (usually about two miles) on which you’ll stumble across about two dozen clues to solve the case.
A sense of direction is handy: I spent as much time working out where to go as cracking clues.
Print out a guided booklet, as I did, or have one posted to you (from £6.99, treasuretrails.co.uk).
You can also download the free ClueKeeper phone app, which allows you to access a variety of location-based hunts around the uK (cluekeeper.com).
Poison in the post
OBVIOusLY the best detectives have no need to trudge the streets, and solve crimes simply through their powers of deduction.
If you can’t be bothered to slide off the sofa, the Grimsby-based Cosy Killer challenge will send you a box of memorabilia every month for a year, which you use to find out what happened to a (fictional) young woman sent to India to find a match in the thirties expat crowd — before going missing.
the first package includes her diary. this subscription challenge is the first of its kind, according to co-founder Jo smedley. the firm plans to launch a new box annually, but if you want to crack this year’s mystery, it’s not too late to join in (£25 to try box one, £275 for a full year, cosykiller.com).
‘We have somebody who learned her best friend was five boxes ahead of her,’ Jo laughs. ‘so she ordered them all at once.’
Make like Houdini
EsCAPE rooms, where you must use your sleuthing skills to crack a case (and so escape the room you’re in), are booming.
there are dozens of rival games up and down the country and plenty are mystery-themed.
At HintHunt near London’s Euston station, for instance, your group is trapped in the private detective’s office where a body has been discovered. You are given an hour to crack hidden clues to discover the culprit (£91.20 for a team of four off-peak, hinthunt.com).
In Manchester, Lucardo offers a murder mystery escape room
(lucardo.com), while in Birmingham and southend-onsea, Escape Live will ask you to turn detective (escapelive.co.uk).
Eavesdrop on crime
POdCAsts have done much to remove the stigma associated with the ‘true crime’ genre (and caused major ripples — the man whose murder conviction was the focus of hit American podcast serial recently won a new trial after 16 years in prison).
In the uK, they Walk Among us is a fortnightly podcast dedicated to examining real-life British cases, painstakingly researched by Rosanna and Benjamin Fitton (theywalkamonguspodcast.com).
For something less gritty, try Case Notes from Classic FM, which delves into musical mysteries such as Haydn’s Missing Head. (And exactly how did the tomb of Austria’s great composer come to contain not one skull, but two?)
Killer train journeys
IF YOu watch detective dramas as much for the clothes as the clues, Burgh Island Hotel, on a tidal island off devon, offers Grade II-listed art deco splendour.
Its Beach House was built as a writer’s retreat for Agatha Christie, who wrote two novels set on the island — Evil under the sun and And then there Were None.
time your visit for one of its murder mystery nights (the next is on November 2 to 3, from £550 per night for the Beach House or from £290 for a double, murder mystery supplement is £135 per room, nonresident places also available).
Or, for more Christie glamour, catch the Belmond British Pullman, the vintage train that is sister to the legendary Orient Express, for a trip during which you’ll enjoy a murder mystery lunch as you interview a cast of suspects (£340pp, 0845 077 2222 or email reservations@belmond.com).
If you prefer the chills of daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca, stay at one of two cottages at her former home Menabilly, on the Cornish coast.
the estate was the inspiration for Manderley, where the narrator of the classic thriller is haunted by reminders of her husband’s dead wife. the former gamekeeper’s cottage sleeps five (from £419 a week, menabilly.com).
THRILLER Where the missing Go is by emma rowley (orion, £7.99). offer price £6.39 (20 per cent discount) until June 18. order at mailshop.co. uk/books or call 0844 571 0640, p&p is free on orders over £15.