Oxford writer explores the landscapes behind crime fiction

In her latest book, Novel Crime Scenes: Twenty Deadly Landscapes, Christina Hardyment explores the landscapes behind 20 crime novels, examining how real places have fuelled fictional mysteries.

Due to be released on April 16 by Bodleian Library Publishing, the book considers locations ranging from Devon’s misty moors in The Hound of the Baskervilles to the vibrant streets of Brick Lane in Ajay Chowdhury’s The Waiter.

The book journeys across Britain, tracing the literary geography of crime fiction from John Buchan’s Galloway Hills to Ellis Peters’s Shropshire, Margery Allingham’s Essex, Colin Dexter’s Oxford, and Peter May’s Hebrides.

Times journalist and broadcaster Libby Purves said: “Hardyment walks appreciatively through dark imaginings, paying enjoyably grateful, sometimes quizzical tribute to the spirit of landscape in classic crime fiction.”

Each chapter uncovers the real-world setting behind the fiction and features specially commissioned maps of these ‘deadly scenes’.

Ms Hardyment also considers what these settings meant to the authors, often by retracing their steps or exploring the locations herself.

Aimed at both armchair detectives and literary travellers, the book offers new perspectives on familiar tales and spotlights lesser-known crime fiction destinations.

Christina Hardyment is a writer and journalist specialising in literary geography and medieval history mysteries.

She is also the author of Novel Houses and Writing The Thames and lives near Oxford.

For more information or to contact Christina Hardyment, readers can reach out to Emma O’Bryen at emma@obryen.co.uk.