Richard Osman is best known for cracking the crime fiction charts, but it turns out he’s just as big a fan of the genre when he’s not writing it.
The Thursday Murder Club author, who has sold millions of books worldwide, opened up about his all-time literary favourite during an appearance on Desert Island Discs on BBC Radio 4 in December 2021.
Osman, who was a regular fixture on TV screens for years thanks to shows like Pointless, spoke candidly about his love of reading, how he approaches storytelling, and the comforting role books play in his life – and, of course, followed the show’s structure of choosing his eight songs he couldn’t live without.
But when it came to narrowing down a single volume to take with him to a desert island, he admitted he couldn’t help himself – and ended up turning the decision into a mental tournament.
“Again, I can’t help turning everything into a format,” he said. “So I was firstly I was thinking, listen, it’s got to be some short stories, because then they got a little bit extra to dip into. And then I think, well, is it crime? Or is it humour?”
“So I drew two semifinals, which were P.G. Wodehouse versus Alan Bennett, short stories and P.G. Wodehouse won that,” he continued. “And I had Agatha Christie versus Patricia Highsmith. And Agatha Christie won that”.
“So it’s a Christie-Wodehouse final. And I think I have to go for the Poirot short stories of Agatha Christie would be the book that I would take.”
The Poirot stories, featuring Christie’s beloved Belgian detective, have long been held up as a high point in crime writing. While Christie is often associated with full-length novels like Murder on the Orient Express and Death on the Nile, her short stories about Poirot are some of her most complexly-written mysteries.
They feature the Belgian detective solving a variety of cases, often with the help of Captain Hastings. These stories, including titles like The Adventure of the Egyptian Tomb and Murder in the Mews, delve into mysteries involving greed, jealousy, and revenge.
Elsewhere in the episode, Osman selected eight pieces of music to take with him to the island, each one representing a key chapter in his life.
He picked Morecambe & Wise’s ‘Bring Me Sunshine’, ‘Metal Mickey’ by his brother’s band Suede, the Snooker (Drag Racer) BBC theme song, ‘You Can’t Stop The Beat’ from the soundtrack of Hairspray, Fiona Apple’s ‘Extraordinary Machine’, Estelle’s ‘American Boy’, ‘Ran’ by Future Islands, and Erasure’s ‘A Little Respect’.