Britbox, 2022. Streaming on TVNZ+. Reviewed by Paul Tankard

A few months ago I’d not heard of actor Lesley Manville. Since then, she’s been in three of our main items of household viewing — four if you’re prepared to leave the house and go to the cinema, where she’s the lead in the remake of Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris. On the streaming services she’s in British crime drama Sherwood, the fifth series of The Crown (in which she’s Princess Margaret) and Magpie Murders.

The last of these is a 2022 six-part murder mystery adapted by Anthony Horowitz from his best-selling 2016 novel. It’s a beguiling story, set in the present, in the world of books and publishing. But it channels the “golden age” detective story, through the clever device of being about a successful novelist, whose detective Atticus Pünd is a German refugee in 1950s London, and whose latest (and final) novel is Magpie Murders: which is both the story, and the story within the story.

The main characters are the publisher Susan Ryeland (the quirky and engaging Lesley Manville) and the fictitious detective (Tim McMullan). Atticus Pünd’s creator, the novelist Alan Conway (Conleth Hill), has made a great deal of money for his formerly boutique publishing company, but is himself a much less likeable character than his gentle and modest detective. Conway maliciously depicts in his fiction people who have annoyed him, and to mirror this a number of the smaller roles in each scenario are played by the same actors, which is intriguing enough to be fun and keeps viewers on their toes.

The contemporary storyline develops when the novelist delivers to his publisher what he vows is the last of his detective novels, and the typescript is found to be lacking its final chapter, shortly before the novelist himself is found dead. To save the firm’s investment, the final chapter (if there is one) needs be found, and Susan Ryeland drives back and forth to Conway’s home in rural Suffolk, and finds herself unearthing information about the author’s network of friends and enemies. To make sense of this she needs the skills of . . . Atticus Pünd himself, who starts helpfully and comfortingly haunting her.

The cleverness is not overplayed. The other strengths of the series are classy production values: a bright palette, good scenery, interesting cinematography and the fine actors. There are veins of satire and fantasy which distance it from the predictable and trivialising self-parody of Midsomer Murders, and keep it intelligent, affecting and witty.

Tui Motu Magazine. Issue 277 December 2022: 28