Most people may know British writer Robert Thorogood from his work in the BBC murder mystery series Death in Paradise with four spin-off novels.
In 2021, he released a new series, The Marlow Murder Club, “love letter to small-town living” according to a 2023 Daily Mail article he wrote. He and his family moved from London to be closer to his wife’s family and found himself in this small town.
In the same article, he continued, “Strangest of all, people were really friendly. The whole time. Surely everyone knew you didn't make eye contact or smile at strangers?” But in time, he grew to love the place, returning the smiles and eye contact.
So he decided it was time to place a series in Marlow because “For me, detective stories are as much about location as they are about the detectives or the suspects, which is why I went for the glories of the Caribbean for the setting of Death In Paradise.”
Plus, he cites the brilliance of Agatha Christie in setting her novels in small towns.
In an interview for Absolutely Magazines, he said, “Marlow is the perfect place for the style of murder mystery I like because, on the surface, it’s quite posh, it has bunting, Michelin-starred restaurants and a beautiful church it just looks so smart. Then you peel away at the layers of all that pretention and reveal that actually everyone has a dark heart of murder within…That’s what Agatha Christie was so great at doing, she’d take you to a very smart country house and show all of these people who you thought of as being your betters, but then you’d discover, during the course of the book, that they were much worse than all of us.”
But of course, setting it in Marlow has its challenges. He did a talk in town where he was criticized for tinkering with the geography of the town.
The fourth book in the series, Murder on the Marlow Belle, comes out in January 2025!
The Marlow Murder Club
Judith Potts is living life on her own terms. She solves crossword puzzles, drinks whiskey, and swims nude in the Thames. Thorogood noted in the Daily Mail interview that he based Judith on his grandmother; she “was a wonderful, independent woman who was sharp as a tack and who'd have exactly one glass of whisky every night at 6pm.”
But during one of her nude swims, she hears an argument and a gunshot at her neighbor’s house. Unfortunately, the police don’t take her seriously.
Naturally, she has to investigate and ends up finding her neighbor’s body. Even then she’s ignored.
So she gets together Suzie Harris, a local dog walker, and Becks Starling, the vicar’s wife, to get to the bottom of it all. As they analyze the clues, the bodies pile up and they have to stop the killer.
Death Comes to Marlow: A Novel (The Marlow Murder Club, 2)
It’s the occasion of the season, Sir Peter Bailey is getting married to Jenny Page, his former nurse. Practically everyone is invited so naturally Judith and her fellow Murder Club members check out Sir Bailey’s mansion.
But the wedding does not go as planned when they find Sir Bailey dead in his locked study, crushed to death by a cupboard. Once again, the police think it’s an unfortunate accident.
Except policewoman Tanika Malik who disagrees and starts to see potential in Judith and her friends. Judith, Suzie, and Becks investigate to find that many people have reason to want him dead.
In the Absolutely Magazines article, he noted that he was inspired by Ricky Gervais’ house (yes, that Ricky Gervais has a home in Marlow) “which is a beautiful Georgian white stucco house just outside Marlow, as the idea for the setting and imagined a very posh family living there and written an old school, country house, locked-room murder mystery.”
The Queen of Poisons: A Novel (The Marlow Murder Club Book 3)
This time the police actually agree with the Marlow Murder Club that the Mayor of Marlow, Geoffrey Lushington was murdered. The mayor dies at a town council meeting with aconite found in his coffee cup.
This time DI Tanika Malik brought them into help as citizen advisers but that wouldn’t have stopped Judith. Now she’s got even more license to do what she feels needs to be done to get to the bottom of the mayor’s murder.
Murder on the Marlow Belle: A Novel (The Marlow Murder Club Book 4)
This time, the Marlow Murder Club gets a missing person case. Verity Beresford’s husband Oliver did not come home after a party on the Marlowe Belle, a ship for the Marlow Amateur Dramatic Society.
So when his body is found with two bullet holes in it, it’s clearly not an accidental drowning. Now Judith and friends have to dive into Oliver’s past to find out which enemy actually killed him.
Featured still from The Marlowe Murder Club TV Series via PBS
