The original golden age of detective fiction in the 1920s followed on from a devastating global pandemic. Is it any wonder, then, that we’ve read so much crime fiction in 2020? And why do we find murder mysteries a comforting choice for Christmas?

This festive season if you’d like to support the podcast and buy a gift for a murder mystery loving friend at the same time, you can purchase a discounted gift subscription for the Shedunnit Book Club at shedunnitshow.com/giftoffer or until 17th December shop the restocked merchandise collection at shedunnitshow.com/shop.

No major spoilers in this episode. However, there is some mention or discussion of the books listed below.

Books and sources:

—The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman

—"The Golden Age" by Stephen Knight in The Cambridge Companion to Crime Fiction

—The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie

—Trent’s Last Case by E.C. Bentley

—Hercule Poirot's Christmas by Agatha Christie

—Forever England by Alison Light

—"The Decline and Fall of the Detection Story" by W Somerset Maugham in The Vagrant Mood

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Find a full transcript of this episode at shedunnitshow.com/achristieforchristmastranscript.

Music by Audioblocks and Blue Dot Sessions. See shedunnitshow.com/musiccredits for more details.

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Hillsdale Dialogues 4-19-2013, Thucydides