On the Agatha Christie Literary Trail....

Torquay

One thing I've always wanted to do, is to visit all the places in Devon that are mentioned in Agatha Christie's books or have featured in some way in Agatha Christie's life. Sometimes they are real locations, sometimes fictional locations based on real places. But it would be nice to see what inspired Agatha Christie - locations such as Torquay, Greenway, Burgh Island, Dartmouth, Kingsbridge, Salcombe...etc. I also love exploring Devon, it's such a beautiful county!!

Luckily, I don't have to start from scratch as I already have a couple of booklets and leaflets with different trails in them. One of them I picked up in the 90's, on one of our holidays to Torquay. It's called 'Exploring Agatha Christie Country' by David Gerrard (published in 1996). It has a trail around Torquay, one around the Coast and Countryside, one by Train and Boat and one that covers further afield. A lot of the places mentioned in this booklet are places that were special to Agatha Christie, such as The Moorland Hotel where she finished writing her first novel - The Mysterious Affair at Styles (1920).

I also have a leaflet that I picked up a few years ago called 'The Agatha Christie Literary Trail'. This will be a big help as it already has a map and list of locations and books (you can download a copy from the English Riviera website). Based on this I'm going to have a look through all my Agatha Christie books, read them again and try and find the references to these locations - then I'll have some context when we visit them!!

I've been thinking about what to include, if it's not too difficult I'm going to try and include the following...

• Places mentioned by name in the novels and short stories
• Fictional locations inspired by real places in the novels and short stories
• Places that were important to Agatha Christie
• Locations that were used for filming for film or tv adaptations

Seems like a big task but I've got a few months to do some research. I might even include a book review or two on here along the way...

So, armed with my booklet, leaflet, books and a map, I'm going to try and plot the best route to cover as many locations as possible...

Let the challenge commence...!