 Hi friends! How are we doing? Today we're bringing back a format that I did a couple times last year for five stars and one stars and we're doing a murder mystery tournament to find out my favorite murder mystery book. Oh my god classic classic yeah round of applause. I'm really really really really excited for this so I've pulled together 16 of my favorite murder mystery books. We're putting them against the test against each other in a murder mystery bracket tournament and we're going to see what comes out on top. I think I know what's going to come out on top at the moment with my current biases but I thought this would be fun to do. Now also don't like there could be two books here that are pitted against each other like my second and third favorite so like we're not don't take what makes the top four as like viable. These are my top four murder mysteries but that's part of the fun of it. Part of the fun of it is when you come across a pairing that like you know really you know are a hard pairing to decide. So yeah we're going to be pitting these against each other. Let me know what your predictions are for what's going to make the top and shall we just get going? Shall we begin? Okay our first pairing is The Broken Girls by Simone St James versus Wrong Place Wrong Time by Gillian McAllister. So this is difficult. The Broken Girls I loved. It's kind of two murder mysteries. There's one murder mystery in the present. Our main protagonist's sister has died and she's trying to investigate what happened to her but also a body is dug up on the ground of this old school and we're having a past time and we're following characters from that school so kind of the implication is one of them is the bodies and this made me fall in love with Simone St James's writing. Honestly it is magical. It is magical the way that she writes. There's always this little speculative element. I thought this was paced perfectly. I thought this was like the perfect little book. Do you know what I mean? I feel like I could recommend this to a lot of people and they would enjoy it. Wrong Place Wrong Time is one of the most unique books I've read. We're following a woman who witnesses her son kill someone. She goes to sleep. She wakes up. It's the previous day. She goes to sleep. She wakes up. It's a day before that. So she's going back in time and she kind of figures out that she needs to uncover the truth of why her son ended up killing someone in order to stop it happening in the present. Here's the thing. I think if you ask me this question based on my initial enjoyment after I read the books, my answer would be different. I think after initial enjoyment after I read the books it would be The Broken Girls. However, I read Wrong Place Wrong Time when I was doing my first ever blog where I read the nominees for Goodreads Choice Awards in the mystery thriller category and I felt like it was a little bit hampered by me having to read so many books in a short space of time and like kind of getting a bit burnt out of mystery solace. But in terms of what has really grown in my mind over time and like I've appreciated more and more and realized more amazing things about, I think it's going to be Wrong Place Wrong Time that moves forward. Oh, it's getting exciting already. Okay, then we've got Your Guide to Not Getting Murdered and An Aquating Village by Maureen Johnson, which is like half a murder mystery. I think we can allow it, you know, it's like taking the piss out of the murder mystery genre. And we've got The Last of Us Die by Richard Osman. This was the no-brainer. This was the banker. This was the one that couldn't fail. This was one that's never failed. So The Last of Us Die is the fourth in the Thursday Murder Club series where, I mean, we're going to see quite a few of these throughout the list, but we're following an elderly cast of characters at a retirement village as murders start appearing on their doorstep that they have to solve. And The Last of Us Die was the most recent one and dear god, if you've read it, I keep getting reactions. People have read it and like talking about the scenes that we all have to read and we all cry and like, I can't explain to you. Let me say some of my thoughts because we're going to be talking about this more, but I just love it. I think The Last of Us Die is an impeccable book and I just want everyone to read this series and read the like, okay, I'll talk about it more. Then I put The Man Who Died Twice in the Bill at the Miss as one entry because I'm not going to lie to you. I can't really distinguish them. I read them like a month apart. All the other Thursday Murder Clubs, I've read like a year apart and those two read a month apart and I need to do a reread to remember what's in what book. I can't distinguish them. I can like view them as an entity together, but I can't really remember the difference between them. So I've put them as an entry and then we've got True Crime Story by Joseph Knox, which is a mixed media about a girl who goes missing as presumed dead and it's all told through interviews of people who were in her life trying to uncover the truth of what happened to her. I mean, I just love The Thursday Murder Club. So like, that one, okay, the third, okay. I feel like this tournament is going to go, it's going to lead a certain way. It's a certain author. It's going to be biased towards... I just accepted that I'm kind of a cheesy bitch that loves... Richard Osman. That might... I don't know if that's going to continue any further than that, but True Crime Story enjoyed, but I remember it being a little bit of a tentative five star, whereas I just love The Thursday Murder Club, but I don't know if that's going to make it any further because to me, the first and the last ones are the strongest spoiler alert. Those two middle ones, I just can't remember the difference between them, but Richard Osman, I just love these books. They're just so good. Okay, the three times for Katie Watson, we're following these three women who have played Dahlia Lively, who is an Akuparo equivalent basically throughout the years, and it's set at a fan convention and they have to solve a murder, and it's so good. It's like the golden age of crime. It really... It pays homage to the genre in such a fun way. It references the character who is the author of Dahlia Lively. It's basically Axe Christie. Axe Christie is mentioned in the story. It's like, oh, she was different from Axe Christie, but really it's paying homage to Axe Christie. And I just thought it was such a fun story for fans of Murder Mysteries to read. The Paris Apartment by Lucie Foley is a controversial one because I loved it, but not everyone else does. How do you know what's good for me? That's my attention! I thought it was so good, but not everyone else loves it. So I only allow missing person mysteries into this, into my categorization of Murder Mysteries, when like it's a strong suggestion throughout the book that they've been murdered, and that's why they're missing. Does that make sense? So there's like, there's a few I allow in. So we're following a girl who goes to Paris to go and stay with her brother, but when she gets there she finds out that he's missing. And she's kind of trying to hunt him down and she's getting to know the characters who live in his Paris Apartment building. And like, they're a bit dodgy, babes. They're a bit dodgy, you know what I mean? They're a bit dodgy. It's a controversial one because I feel like everyone else hated this, but I really enjoyed it. I thought the Midway Twist, it's one of those books that like, I love a Midway Twist that completely flips the book on its head. It completely changes what you think of the story. It completely puts on a new path in the story. And I thought it was such a good one. I really don't see it coming. I love a book where a twist makes a memory. I can still remember, like years later, where I was sitting on the sofa in Tom's house when I read that twist and I was gagged, gooped and shocked and like delivered in the hands of God, like absolutely I had a heart attack and died because what a good twist. So I think I'm going to put the Paris Apartment forward. I would recommend the Three Darlies to more people. Absolutely. I would, for you watching, I would more recommend that you try the Three Darlies than the Paris Apartment because I know not everyone has loved it. But for me personally, I just love Lucy Foley and what she does and like the way she takes the piss out of rich people. I think she just has a really great finger on the pulse of that. Okay, then we've got our first act of the Christie on the noose next side. We've got the murder of Roger Ackroyd, which I don't, there's like a guy called Roger Ackroyd who's been murdered. That's like all you need to know about it. It's set in like a quaint English village like a lot of Agathas are. What really makes this book is the twist. It's one of Agatha's best twists. It's kind of renowned for being an incredible twist. So that's what makes the book. And then we've got the Devil of the Dark Water by Stuart Turton, which is a historical mystery set on a ship. And we're kind of following a character who's kind of like the Watson to a character Sherlock. The Sherlock in the story is locked up on the boat as a prisoner. And his Watson is kind of like wandering around the ship. Waddling? No, wondering. He's not a waddling. He's wandering around the ship. And things start occurring. Devil symbols start appearing. Animals start getting killed. And then people maybe start getting killed. And they're like, is it the devil? Is it a person? What's going on? And I really, really enjoyed that. I think the Devil of the Dark Water is crazy. Here's the thing with Stuart Turton. His endings don't quite stick to the landing. Or like his endings are often kind of so bonkers that you kind of just have to like, okay, you have to suspend disbelief a little bit. And that's the case in this one. It's complete opposites here because the rest of the book, the lead up to the ending makes this book. And the ending is a little bit iffy. Whereas the rest of this book is a little bit, you know, not as, it's still good, but it's not as effective. But the ending makes it. They're complete opposites. I think for what it's done to the genre, I'm going to have to put the murder of Roger Ackroyd. Yeah, I think I'm going to have to make that decision. I think that's what I'm going to have to go for. Okay, then our next pairing. We've got one by one by Ruth Ware, which let's just talk about it for a second. Miss Ruth Ware. Miss Ruth Ware wrote a classic isolated murder mystery for us once with one by one. She did it, right? She gave me what I wanted. And then all you guys didn't like it and scared her off. And now she's writing stupid ass domestic thrillers. And I'm fucking pissed off. I can see you're getting angry. Angry. No, I'm not angry. I'm livid. She turned into a modern act of Christy and you guys were like, do I care? Like support modern murder mysteries. I still have a lot of grudges about that. So one by one is about this company who go on like a ski retreat to this resort and they start dying one by one. So it's set a ski resort. It's so good. To me, it's one of Ruth Ware's best. And you guys, we're just getting another fucking husband and wife domestic thriller this year. And then this, I just put it as a place for all the Lady Hard Castle mysteries because I put it in the market for murder because I think that is my favorite one the second, but there's loads of five stars or otherwise loads of this board would have been Lady Hard Castle Mysteries. So the Lady Hard Castle Mysteries are Edwardian mysteries where we're following Lady Hard Castle and her made flow as they retire to this quaint English village and they find out it's the murder hotspot of the world. It's them solving murders together. It's very much a cozy mystery series, my favorite cozy mystery series. It's going to be Lady Hard Castle Mysteries. I love them. I love Lady Hard Castle Mysteries. It's just the fact that I'm so deep into the series. I love Lady Hard Castle and her made flow so dearly. I love them so dearly. And it's just like one of my favorite series. I just realized something. These last four are the four that I put as my top four in my best murder mysteries video. And I've got to put them against each other. This is Diabolical. I feel sick. I've got migraine. I've got headache. No, forget it. I'm sorry Anna. You'll have to swap around. Fucking takes the piss. So many of these would have made it further. Had the pairings been different. Okay, interesting. Why do I do this to myself? Okay, we've got a Good Girls Guy Tomato versus Murder on the Aurine Express. Murder on the Express that's the start of that is one of Acrocracies most well known and I think for good reason. It was the first murder mystery I ever read. I might have read the guest list before it but one of the early murder mysteries I ever read and Urquiporo is on the Aurine Express and a guy is murdered on the train and it's under very unusual circumstances. All the evidence is kind of contradictory and he sits down with each of the characters on the train and kind of interviews them. It's kind of an interview format which I love. And then a Good Girls Guy to Murder, many of you all know, is a mixed media murder mystery series where Pip is trying to solve the cold case of the disappearance slash possible probable, oh my nail just broke. That's not fun. Probable murder of a girl from her school. I actually can't talk because I really don't know what I'm going to pick. What am I going to pick? Make this decision please. I can't make this decision. I haven't read either of these in such a long time that it's difficult. I love a Good Girls Guy to Murder. I love the mixed media but I love the interview format of Murder on the Aurine Express and I love the twist in Murder on the Aurine Express. These could be like, these are up there. These four are so up there that this is painful. I don't know Jesus. I could flip a coin. I generally, I don't know what to pick. I keep flipping between the two. I keep flip-flopping. What am I supposed to pick? What am I supposed to pick? A Good Girls Guy to Murder or Murder on the Aurine Express? I don't know what to express with Good Girls Guy to Murder. It's more the fact that like if this was further deep in I could deal with it but it's like consigning one of these to not making pass the first round is really painful to me. I think I'm leaning towards Murder on the Aurine Express. That's painful. I don't know if I stand by that. I don't know if I stand by that. That's really painful. If it was as good as dead. As good as dead isn't a murder mystery but like I think as good as dead might have won and I know that's a controversial opinion because I saw this TikTok the other day or not TikTok, it was on YouTube Shorts. It was obviously originally TikTok. Bless this girl. I'm not calling her out but she was like, yeah read the first two of the Good Girls Guy to Murder on the Aurine Express and then don't read the last one. Don't read it. And I'm like, she's like, it's a different series. It's a different character. I'm like, you're not you're not. You understand that that is the perfect arc to Pip's journey and it is an incredible critique of true crime and a true crime genre and I was angry. I was angry. It's a perfect book. I love as good as dead. I know that's an unpopular opinion. I love both of these. These are both top, top tier. You know, this is painful. This is painful, painful. And then we're going to get into more painful because I know these were my top two when I did my favorite murder mysteries video. We've got The Guest List by Lucy Foley, which again was a transformative book for me in getting into murder mysteries. It was one of the first murder mysteries I ever read and we're at this wedding on this island and we know it from the first chapter that someone's been killed that night. And then we go back to kind of the day before the wedding and meet our characters and travel through time with them with occasional flashbacks to the night of the wedding. I think it is so good. The Guest List is so good. And the Thursday Murder Club is of course the first in the Thursday Murder Club series, my favorite murder mystery series. And I think the first one is really strong. Fuck. This is horrible. I can't do it. You can. You can do it. You can. You can. I love the first one. The first one made me cry. I think it's a great introduction to the characters. I think the mystery is very strong. Here's my thinking, right? If I was to rank these today in terms of ranking, I think I would put the Thursday Murder Club above the Guest List. However, I feel like it's represented. It's legacy is represented in the next round. So I am tempted to move the Guest List forward because I think that the Paris Department is something different, right? This is a series, right? Do I need half of the next round to be Thursday Murder Club books? Probably not. Probably not, you know? Even though I think this Thursday Murder Club is better than those, and like if I was to rank it in terms of like third, fourth, whatever, I think the Thursday Murder Club would be ranked above the Guest List. But I think I'm going to move the Guest List forward because of how transformative it was for me in terms of reading murder mysteries. And I do just love it. I love that book. But I love the Thursday Murder Club. No. I'm just going to pretend this is in with these like over or something. Well, no, it's not because I'm going to probably make a decision. I don't know. I don't know. I'm going to move the Guest List forward. But I think I as a book, I do prefer the Thursday Murder Club, but I feel like it's represented. That's the way I'm getting out of that. Does that make sense? No, you have made the wrong decision. Okay, we're into our rounds now. I don't have to give you synopsis. You know what we're dealing with. This is a very tough one because I think again, if I was to make my best murder mysteries video today, these would both be up there. I love wrong post wrong time. I love it. I'm so excited to read more from Julie McAllister. I think it's a wonderful book. I think it's it says it's one of those murder mysteries that says so much about human nature and about our need to love the people that we love in the moment and living in the moment. I think it's wonderful. But like, it's against the last devil to die. Like, what do you want me to do? What do you want me to do? What do you want me to do? I just want to talk about last time with today and Richard Osman and there's a lot of conversations in general because I said this all the time but I have never, I have never, ever, ever read books that distill human nature down to its core and essence like Richard Osman does. He is a genius. I can listen to this man talk forever. I'm obsessed with his podcast and he's got a podcast. I think the way that he looks at the way that we as humans behave and what we love and what lights us up and what the little nuances that we have, I think he is the best, the best at knowing that. I love him. I love him. I love him. I love him. I love him. I'm so glad that he's an author. I'm so glad that he's writing books. I'm so blessed. Like, think of how many like Richard's he's like he's got a lot of years left in him. Think of how many Richard Osman books. I make it sound as if he's old. He's not like he's not. But like, just think of how many Richard Osman books we could get in our lifetimes. He's published in one a year. Like, I could die having read like, I don't know, 40 Richard Osman books. Wouldn't that be a blessing? Isn't that incredible? I love it. Then we have got the man who died twice in the book of mercy versus the Paris apartment. See, because like as much as I love them, I can't remember much what happened between these two. I'm going to move the Paris apartment forward. However, I just want to let you know, if in this first round here, it was a good guys guide to murder versus the Paris apartment, a good guy to murder would be here. But it's in this, it's lost in the first round. Like that is absolutely crazy. Do you know what I mean? This isn't, this is difficult. This is difficult. But I think because of my memory, it would be, it would be dishonest of me to move this forward anymore. I kind of know what they were, but I just, I read them too close to each other. I read them in the month of each other and it's too, it's too cool. They've blurred in my memory. That's why sometimes I don't like reading series close to one another because I do find it hard to differentiate what happened in each book, you know? Sometimes that's fine. Like I read Jade Warren Jade Legacy from Funderly back to back. And so those kind of like form one book in my mind. And that's kind of a good thing because it's so epic. But yeah, sometimes it's not a good thing. Then we have got The Murder of Roger Acroyd versus Lady Hardcastle Mysteries. Lady Hardcastle Mysteries, I'm moving forward. These are one of my top recommendations for you guys. If you're wanting a historical cozy mystery, I think they are written so well. And they're like, book 11 is about to come out. Like there's so many books to read. The audiobooks, I would always recommend you listen to the audiobooks. I get the physicals now because I love them so much. But like, I think for the first like three or four books, I just read them via audio and I loved them. I love this series. I love Lady Hardcastle, Her Made Flow, the humor, the wit, the joy, the fun. They're so fun. They're so happy. They also, even though it's about murders, I just think they are the most fun read ever. I love them. I just do because I feel better. If I feel better, I'm nicer. If I'm nicer, my life goes better because if I'm nicer, then you're going to be nicer to me. And then we've got Murder on the Ori Express versus the guest list. Can't do it. My heart is saying no. They're so different. I love them for such different reasons that I find these very hard to compare. Like, because it's an older book, right? The Murder on the Express. There's certain moments of that. Like the opening of Murder on the Express, it's a little bit boring. You know what I mean? It's a little bit boring. But the guest list is so readable. But I think in terms of twists, Murder on the Express is a better twist. Murder on the Express is one of the best twists in a murder mystery ever to exist, in my opinion. And I love the interview format. But the guest list is more readable. And I just love it. I love the way that it was formatted. I love the characters. I love the way Lucy Foley has these kind of archetypal characters. I think I've got to move Murder on the Ori Express forward. I think it is just... It's probably my favourite Christie. It's my favourite Christie. Then we've got the last episode of the first of the Paris Apartment. It's easy. I'm sorry. Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep. The Paris Apartment should probably not have made it this far. It just got lucky in its battle. It just, it made it out lucky, you know? It shouldn't have made it this far. And again, if it had been a good girl's guide to murder, a good girl's murder would be up here. And that would be a better, you know, butler out. This four, these two pairings here, absolutely diabolical. Then we've got Lady Hardcastle Mysteries versus Murder on the Ori Express. Is it crazy? I think I've got to go to Lady Hardcastle Mysteries. I think because it's a series and I, now this series to me is like almost always going to be a five star. I love this series. It's such a comfort series to me. Then I think I've got to move that forward, even though Act of Christie arguably, you know, probably higher quality. And then the final battle is the last double to die versus the Lady Hardcastle Mysteries. We all know, we all know that the last double to die is going to win. Now, like I said at the beginning, this is recency bias because I read this fairly recently and so it's in my brain. But what a book, and like the fact that we're not getting anything as a medical this year, I know he's publishing a new, Rachel Smith is publishing a new series. I'll put the cover here. It's called We Solve Murders. I'm very excited. I love the cover. All murder mystery covers are going to look like this now because they all look like the last in medical series. I just think, A, the mystery in this is wonderful, but without spoiling anything, the human, I'm going to cry. The human, the human story in this book is amazing. It's amazing. And I love what Richard Osman is doing in the genre. And I hope that we keep and keep, I hope the success of him, you know, being the most successful here in the UK, these are the most successful series. They are some of the most successful books. They're the most bought, they're the most length in the library, you know, he's really like, it's really massive here in the UK. And I just hope that we keep getting more mainstream murder mysteries because of this and not just ripoffs, not just cozy murder mysteries with elderly characters, like I want, I want all types of murder mysteries because of the success of these. It doesn't make sense. I just, I, I, I hope publishing wakes up to the fact that we don't just want old people serving murder mysteries. We want all types of murder mysteries. But I mean, I love old people serving murder mysteries, but there's just so many that are like identical, there's a matter of club and like think of all, like let's get more the guest list. Let's get more one by ones. Let's get more wrong place from times. Like let's get all different types of murder mysteries. I just need more. I just, this is my, this is my push for just every book to be published to be a matter of mystery. No, we're not surprised that it won. I am surprised that certain books made it like, probably the first murder cup should have won over the guest list. Probably the press hub should not have made it this far. Like that's the thing about doing a tournament like this, like it's this is not my ranking of this. It's just when you put these books to back it out against each other on a certain day, I might choose a certain book, you know? But anyways, I hope you guys enjoyed this video of me battling my murder mysteries against each other and to put them in a tournament format, not ranking them, but putting them in a tournament format to find my favorite. And I mean, my current favorite is the last day of the day. We're not surprised. But yeah, if you, if you doubt my, my, my decisions, that's okay. I do too. Anyways, I hope you guys enjoyed this video and I'll see you very soon in another one.