Hello everyone and welcome to this very exciting, at least for me, and rather nerve racking time. My book on the Lewis TV series has been published. It has a paperback version and a Kindle version. Links for both are below.
The book has been over a year of my life. My only disappointment was not getting all the locations especially the pubs. I think I couldn’t identify four or five pubs. This is tied in with why it took longer than maybe it should have as I was trying to get as many locations as possible but eventually I had to decide what was more important, getting the book out now after about 18 months of work on it, or keep trying to refine the book for another six months. I chose the former.
I have placed a list of the locations I couldn’t find at the back of the book. If I should find or be told by a reader the identification of one of those missing locations I will create a downloadable PDF or Word document when a few have been collected and post it here on my website.
Here is the link for the Kindle version. It is available in many other countries; USA and most of Europe.
Here is the link to the paperback.
So, that is about it. I had hoped to have the paperback in colour but the cost to you would have prohibitive. However, it can be seen in colour on the Kindle Fire.
I hope you not only buy the book but also enjoy it.
I’m hoping you will find it a good companion as you watch the Lewis series.
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Well done, that’s a big achievement. Question- I’ve only seen half an epi of Lewis. I am currently busy working through the Morse Tv series plus the earlier series of Endeavour I’d not seen. When I’m ready to start Lewis, should I watch each episode first before consulting your book entry, or vice versa? I assume the book is arranged by episode…?
Hello Wolfie. Well the book does contain spoilers. Personally, if you are coming to series for the first time, I would watch the episode first and then watch it again with the book beside you. My main aim is to make the book a companion piece to the series and hopefully add to one’s enjoyment of the wonderful Lewis series.
Thanks Chris, will do. As long as it’s safe spoiler-wise to read each episode breakdown right after I’ve finished watching its corresponding episode (which is how I read this blog), I’ll do that. Looking forward to it.
Many congratulations Chris, I hope that it will be a roaring success!
Congratulations on getting the book this far – you have worked so hard! well done Chris I appreciate all your endeavours 🙂
Thank you Di. ‘Endeavours’? Intentional pun?
Congratulations, Chris! I have purchased it and look forward to referring to it on my next visit across the pond.
Thank you Alexis, I do hope you enjoy it.
This is great. I eagerly look forward to reading your creation. Well done, you!
Thank you, I hope you enjoy it.
Congratulations. I just ordered on amazon!! Can’t wait to check it out.
Thank you for rekindling my interest in Morse, Lewis and Endeavour. I am now collecting the Morse books (again!!). I still remember reading them in the 80s. again Congratulations!!
Thank you very much Jean. Not just for buying the book but for your kind words. I hooe you enjoy it.
Wonderful work, Chris. Purchased it already. The definitive guide in the future for my wife and I in our (re-)watching of Lewis…
Thank you Simon, much appreciated.
Wonderful documentary. Plus, it’s always good to leave a mystery unsolved for the readers to play with — all those pubs.
Thank you Chris, I’ll look on Amazon
Congratulations, Chris!
As a published author myself, I totally agree with what you said about just getting the damned thing published already, even if there were some blanks: “…eventually I had to decide what was more important, getting the book out now after about 18 months of work on it, or keep trying to refine the book for another six months. I chose the former.”
You chose wisely. Probably every author out there has to resist the temptation to edit, and edit, and edit … and you just have to force yourself to STOP. Yes, you’ll eventually find out where (at least some of) those missing pubs are, now that it’s too late. But if you had sat on the book for another six months, it STILL wouldn’t have been as perfect as you would have liked, believe me, it never is! Think of it as an excuse to publish a second edition later. 😉
Thank you Clare. If I should garner more information at least I am lucky in having this website to disseminate that new information. Good luck with your books.
Much congratulations, Chris! I am purchasing now!
Such good news, Chris. I’ll be waiting for the paperback. Congratulations on a labor of love.
Congratulations! This is really something to look forward to, and I’ll be watching for it to be available in paperback.
Your comments and observations are always so enjoyable and add so much to the Morse Universe experience.
I appreciate all your work.
Thank you Frances. I do hope you enjoy it.
Great news Chris. I’ve ordered my copy this morning. It’ll make a superb birthday present from me to me.
Thank you so much Mark. I do hope you enjoy it.
It’s arrived. I can have a full on Morse anorak day tomorrow. Read the book during the day and watch the new episode of Endeavour in the evening. Perfection.
Have a great day and I hope you enjoy the book. I hope the book may entice you to fit in a Lewis episode as well.
Wowee Chris, Amazing achievement; you’re really one of the Greats!! I will try to get it through my Kindle, hope would do it from Chile- Southamerica. We’ve been through a lot, these last months as a country but we’ll keep going. Let you know the outcome….God Blessed you Ever!!
Oh thank you Maria. I do hope you can order it in Chile too. Take care
I am SO excited!!! I’ve just ordered it and am so looking forward to it. I plan to do as I did with the Morse book – watch an episode and then go to the book and read about it. I am really very, very pleased you did this. Congratulations!!
Thank you Nan, I hope you enjoy it.
Congratulations! A great achievement! Looking forward to reading it. I hope you got university credit for it!
Hello Chris,
Congratulations with your book, just ordered the paperback and can’t wait to read it!!!
Saturday the 28th of March i will visit Oxford and use your book as a guide /help for the different locations.
Karel
Thank you Karel. I hope you enjoy it and that it proves useful during your visit to Oxford.
I would like to thank you for this tremendous accompaniment to the Lewis series, and all the hard work and diligence that entailed. My copy I purchased, arrived on Saturday through the post, and it was eagerly anticipated. I have had an early browse of your book, and the flming locations are particularly enjoyable to discover, and will make rewatching many of the episodes, all the more interesting.
I just have a couple of queries to ask you. Firstly, In the filming locations you have included for the great episode “And the Moonbeams Kiss the Sea”, at the 10 minute mark you have written, “Cannot find a name for the bridge. It is south of the 2 and can be seen from Magdalen Bridge. (Bridge where Lewis meet Nell and Philip)”. I’m not quite sure what you mean by south of the number 2, are you referring to the number placed on the map for this episode, a few pages later, which would mean south of the Quod Restaurant?
Secondly, regarding your review of the season 4 opening episode “The Dead of Winter”, an episode I very much enjoyed with Hathaway’s past history explored and his character becoming slightly more rebellious, not unlike Morse, as he flirts with a murder suspect, who was an old friend from his childhood.
My question comes from the fact that you say “the apparent suicide of Ralph Grahame doesn’t make sense and his reason for doing so is never made clear”. From my understanding, although I may be completely wrong, and would bow to your better judgement, I thought Ralph Grahame was killed by Paul Hopkiss, who then dressed it up to make it look like a suicide. Hopkiss had created the fiction of Dr Stephen Black becoming the lover of Grahame’s wife, with those forged love letters written by Scarlett Mortmaigne, as they wanted the police to believe that Grahame’s wife had left him for Dr Black. The death of Black, they had tried to portray as Grahame’s doing, as they were attempting to make it look like he had commited a murder of the man who had run off with his wife, and that he had then, committed suicide afterwards. This is not dissimilar to the pilot episode, “Reputation”, when the killer tried the same tactic on Danny Griffin, of course, the writer for both these episodes was none other than Russell Lewis, albeit not the screenplay for the pilot episode, merely the story outline.
As we know the real reasons for the murders perpetrated by Hopkiss are to stop Dr Black discovering the dead wife of Grahame, who was buried under the statue, which he had thought concealed the buried treasure of a King. Linda Grahame had been killed many years previously by Hopkiss, because she had found out about Augustus Mortmaigne’s abuse of her child.
Hi James. Sorry for the error in regard to the location information. It should read ‘south of the Botanic Gardens’. I think I had been planning another type of map so the number ‘2’ was a place holder. The suicide of Ralph Grahame is explained but I thought in a rather nebulous way and because of this it could easily be missed. Thank you for buying, James and I hope you continue to enjoy it.
Thanks very much for the information Chris, and I’ll have to rewatch that Lewis episode at some point, to see if I can catch the rather vague reasons behind Grahame’s suicide. Thanks also for explaining the error, and what it should have said, regarding that filming location. Hope you enjoy the new series of Endeavour that begins tonight, and I look forward to your episode reviews, when you can find the time.
Really looking forward to reading the book thank you.
Thank you, I do hope you enjoy it.
Whilst continuing to read this great companion to the Lewis series, I have just noticed a very small omission, with regards to the third episode of series six, “Fearful Symmetry”. Two actors are listed as having connections with the Morse or Endeavour series, namely Con O’Neill and Bronson Webb. However, a third actor has been mistakenly left out, that actress is Anna Wilson-Jones, she played Stanza Massey in this Lewis episode. Famously of course, she played an important part in the final Morse episode, “The Remorseful Day”, as the doctor, Sandra Harrison, who was also daughter of the murder victim. I think the publishers are probably to blame for this minor error, as you created a video on your YouTube page, of actors, who have appeared in more than just the one series of Morse, Lewis or Endeavour, and Anna Wilson-Jones was included in that compilation.
Interestingly, in the final episode of this year’s series of Vera, Caroline O’Neill and Anna Wilson-Jones both appeared in that, and their respective characters had connections with the betting industry. Caroline O’Neill played the part of a bookie who had previously been assaulted in a betting shop, some time ago, but had not received significant compensation. It reminded me of her role in the Lewis episode “And the Moonbeams Kiss the Sea”, where she was the wife of a gambling addict, who had been murdered.
Hi James. Unfortunately, its my mistake. I will be creating an errata and corrigendum to publish as a downloadable PDF. Thankfully, only two errors have surfaced. I’m glad you are enjoying it.
Thanks for the very swift reply. I hope I’m not causing you too much trouble, pointing out these very minor errors, and giving you more work to do, when you must already be very busy with university studies. Thanking you once again for all your efforts on the Lewis book, and this excellent website, it is much appreciated.
Not at all James. I would love to think I’m perfect but unfortunately I’m not. 😉
I have continued to dip in and out of this excellent book of yours Chris, thank you. It certainly comes into its own, when watching an episode of Lewis, and you can refer back to the book, while watching, to pick out little pearls of information, that make the show even more enjoyable. I admire your daughter’s lovely little portraits and drawings of the main characters in Lewis, and the pictures of the Hertford Bridge and Radcliffe Camera, that are included at the start of each series you review.
I hope you don’t mind that I just have some questions for you. Firstly when you delivered your verdict for the final ever Lewis episode, “What Lies Tangled”, which was an emotional and riveting ride, with thankfully a satisfying happy ending, mistakenly the rating out of 10, has been left out for this episode finale. I could possibly estimate the score you awarded it, from the succinct review you wrote, but I thought it was better to ask you personally.
Secondly, in “Generation of Vipers”, another episode I believe you and I found very interesting, with the new concept of social media and trolling investigated, in the filming locations you include for each episode, in this one you say and I quote, “I think the fictional Port Meadow is South Park, on the outskirts of Oxford City”.
The question that arises is, are you trying to point out that Port Meadow is fictional in this episode, as it is based on another location, namely South Park, because of course, in reality Port Meadow is not fictional. As you know, it is a large meadow of open common land beside the River Thames, to the north and west of Oxford, almost stretching as far south as Jericho, to then, as far north as Godstow and Wolvercote.
MAJOR SPOILER OF LEWIS EPISODE
My final point of discussion focuses on the episode, “The Quality of Mercy”. It was an entertaining tale, although unusually for a Lewis episode, I found it a touch inauthentic, regarding the storyline, about how the main characters dealt, with the uncovering at last, of the person that had killed Lewis’s wife, in a hit and run. Hathaway discovers this momentous piece of information, and is understandably unsure how to approach Lewis with this new evidence. He goes to see Ch Supt. Innocent, and I would have thought in her role as the highest ranking officer, and also clearly seeing that Hathaway was struggling to deal with how he could relay the news to Lewis, she should have said, leave it to me, I’ll tell Lewis straight away. Instead, if I remember rightly, she says something to Hathaway, on the lines of, you should test your relationship with Lewis.
It then, admittedly leads to some dramatic scenes between Lewis and Hathaway, when Lewis finds out Hathaway has witheld this important information. However, Lewis is eventually able to, at last, interview his wife’s killer. I know Lewis said, “Hathway as a good officer, you would prevent me from assaulting the hit and run driver”, but as a deeply personal case for Lewis, in reality I would say, his senior officers wouldn’t have granted him, the responsibilty of interviewing the suspect. Maybe, he would only have been allowed, to see and hear him interviewed, by other detectives, from behind a screen. Perhaps I am slightly overreacting, it is a TV drama after all, and it was nice to see the case eventually solved, so Lewis could finally move on, from the grief of his wife’s death. In addition, Morse, during the original series, had once been involved in a very personal case, investigating the mysterious suicide of his niece, so I suppose I am being a little harsh.
Hi James, i’m glad you are enjoying the book. I actually left out a rating for the final episode on purpose. My thinking was that it would be almost crass and insensitive to rate the episode as it was the final one of what had been a great series. I was also thinking that if I scored the episode it would be like me hammering in the final nail of the series and admitting it was the end. I hope that makes sense. In regard to Port Meadow I should have written the apparently fictional Port meadow. Your points about Lewis are valid but being authentic but it would have certainly been less entertaining if it had been left to Lewis superiors. Allowing Hathaway to do it also tested their relationship and ended up telling us a lot about how they felt about each other professionally and personally. I hope you don’t mind but I have added a line in your comment in regard to spoilers.
Thank you Chris, for taking the time to respond to my comments, that is very good of you. Thanks also for answering my questions fairly and sensibly. I realise now, why you have chosen not to give a rating out of 10, for the final episode of the whole Lewis series, and that is very understandable. In addition, you have still wriiten a concise and complimentary review for this episode finale. As you say, admitting that this great series has come to an end is a difficult one, and let us just hope that one day, there will be a Hathaway series.
It certainly makes sense as well, for your to point out in my comments, that a major spoiler of a Lewis episode is revealed. In particular, for those who have not been lucky enough yet, to watch the entire Lewis series.
Furthermore, thanks for replying to my discussion about the episode “The Quality of Mercy”. I agree with you, that although slightly inauthentic, it did allow Lewis and Hathaway’s relationship to be tested. At the heart of the reason we watch the show, is the working relationship between Lewis and Hathaway, and how the “dynamic duo” go about investigating the crimes in Oxford. As a result, when a crime is committed that is of a very personal nature, to either of the aforementioned detectives, you do want to see how this impacts them individually, and how it effects their relationship, as a working pair or detective double act.
That is all for now, thanks for clearly explaining your answers to my comments, and all the good work you do on this website, it is much appreciated.
You’re very welcome James. I always enjoy reading your comments.
I am so hoping there will be a Hathaway series-soon! He can even use his music as part of the character’s expanding life after Lewis retired!
Your certainly not alone in the hope for a Hathaway series.
What a great surprise to find your book in my mailbox today…and a week early. Time to redo Lewis one episode at a time with your guide beside me. If you have to “social distance”, this is the way to do it. Thanks again, Chris, for your great blog!
Thank you Al and I hope you enjoy the book.
Hi Chris. As you know, I enjoyed reading your excellent Lewis book, which must have taken a lot of hard work to put together. You kindly told me a few weeks ago, that if you had included every reference, connection, and small filming location detail, your Lewis guide would probably be, almost twice as long. As a consequence, you clearly must have had to make, some ruthless cuts, unfortunately.
However, in your review of the third episode, in the sixth series of Lewis, “Fearful Symmetry”, first broadcast in 2012, I was surprised to find that in my copy, there was no mention of its tangible connection to the Endeavour episode, “Neverland”, first televised, in 2014. In this Lewis story, the murder victim, the babysitter, Jessica Lake, grew up in a children’s home, called Boxgrove, alongside two other friends, that featured in the episode, Kyle Hutchinson and Silas Whitaker. In addition, Marion Hammond’s assistant, Midge Davies, had also spent some time in her childhood, at Boxgrove. This of course, has a connection with the episode, “Neverland”, from Endeavour, as Boxgrove is the successor to the horrific chidren’s home, Blenheim Vale. In that episode, Morse and Thursday, managed to dig up some shocking information about Blenheim Vale’s past, which caused explosive and traumatic ramifications, for both of them, and many others, such as D.S. Jakes. Needless to say, that ubiquitous scribe of the Endeavour series, Russell Lewis, wrote both of these episodes, I have been talking about.
There are a couple of other connections, from this Lewis episode, but I will admit they are possibly, rather tenuous. The murder victim, the babysitter, is found with ties or restraints attached from her, to the bed, similar to the murder victim, in the final episode of the original Morse series, “The Remorseful Day”. My final connection, is the fact, that the wealthy couple, who hired the babysitter, live in the exclusive and fictional, “Arcadia Park Estate”. In Endeavour, “Arcadia”, was the name of the second episode, from the third series. Furthermore, the couple, move to a hotel, while their house is a crime scene, and this hotel overlooks the prestigious, “Arcadia Park Golf Course”. I say prestigious, because in your book, Chris, you say the real name of the hotel and golf course, is the fairly well known, Oxfordshire Golf Hotel and Golf Course, that has held professional golf tournaments.
Obviously, given the size of your very informative and interesting book, mistakes are very understandable. I have made errors, just through writing comments on your website, so I can’t imagine what you must have to go through, when writing a book, and then having it published. Anyway, thank you Chris, for compiling, such a great companion to the Lewis series.
Finally, I can confirm, I will be joining you tonight, to watch the Lewis episode, “The Dead of Winter”, written by someone, with the name, Russell Lewis, now where I have heard of him before? Anyway, I have really enjoyed this episode in the past, but I did have a question about it, which I asked you a few months ago, and you were able to correct me. Reading your review of it, in your book Chris, I am slightly less sure of its quality now. However, I still believe it to be a entertaining episode, and it is good to discover more about Hathaway’s background, and where he grew up. That is all for now, thank you, and all the best.
I have slapped the back of my hand several times while chanting, I must do better.
Hi Chris. Thanks for kindly replying. There is no need for you to admonish yourself, as I am very grateful for all your hard work, which helped create your excellent book, and that goes into this very informative website. I haven’t told you this before, but I am a great sports fan. I enjoy watching cricket, tennis, snooker and football. I played cricket in the past, a few years ago, for my local team, Clacton-on-sea, and I regularly played snooker, with a friend, before the terrible crisis struck. However, during the peak of the lockdown, there was of course, precious little sport to follow, so your website, has in part, helped to keep me entertained, thank you. That’s all for now, and all the best to you.
Hi Chris. I just wondered if you had found the chance or time, to observe my comments above, from the other day. After the first connection, I mentioned, regarding the fictional children’s home Boxgrove, created of course, by Russell Lewis, I will admit, that the other two connections are fairly tenuous, and I would not have expected them to have been included in your book. Nevertheless, I thought they were worth acknowledging, all the same.
Perhaps, Russell Lewis, named the area and golf course, the Arcadia Park Estate, where the wealthy couple lived, and in which the babysitter was found murdered, because even though, it seemed a prosperous and affluent, suburban area, deep within, there were some guilty and rather sordid secrets, that had not been revealed. A brutal murder had taken place there, and the couple were far from virtuous, they were in fact “swinging”, and involved, with another wealthy couple. Anyway, that is all for now. Thank you, and all the best.
Congratulations Chris on your great book. My copy arrived yesterday and I am so delighted with it. You did an excellent job collecting all those details. The photos and especially maps will be useful if I ever visit Oxford again. Now it will be by my side as I re-watch episodes from Lewis. It shall add another level to my enjoyment of the series. Thank you Chris.
Will you consider another book maybe on the Endeavour series?
Hi Felicity. Thank you so much for your lovely comment. I will be writing a book on the Endeavour series and had planned to publish it after the eighth and last series. However, with the pandemic pushing the filming back many months of the eighth series I doubt I will get it punished before the end of next year.
Chris, I will look forward to your Endeavour book. A light on the horizon during theses difficult times.
Chris – your book was great. What an amazing body of work and effort. I have always been a great fan of Lewis. For a few series of Endeavour I thought that series was pulling away from Lewis in quality (only marginally as I felt the two series had different feels to them from the get go) but since about S5 (and certainly S7) of Endeavour have felt that Lewis stayed much truer to its format.
I do suspect that was because Kevin Whately had less influence over the finished product (he never demanded to direct episodes and though not sure I doubt he had dialogue re-written and devised characters and plot lines)
One question – I know the whole ‘Hathaway’ series as been suggested but mainly disregarded due to what seems Lawrence’s non-interest. I would have to wonder whether his decision to start a political party and rather distasteful (IMO) fall out with Rebecca Front make that extremely unlikely even if he had changed his mind….???
Apologies – that should be ‘requested to direct episodes’ – ‘demanded’ sounds rather hostile.
Hi Maria. Thank you buying my book and I’m glad you are enjoying it. Unfortunately, Fox has forgotten his acting and music fans and is more interested in entertaining his new fans who only turned up after his appearance on BBC’s Question Time. His latest political venture is assuredly going to crash and burn. Forget a Hathaway series. I doubt Fox will get much in the way of acting jobs in the future nevermind being offered a leading role. The Rebecca Front debacle was disgusting and shame on Laurence for allowing that to happen. He is burning bridges all over the place.
You are probably correct when writing that Kevin didn’t interfere with the scripts in the same Shaun Evans has.
Yes agree – I could not believe that he published her private messages with him and then tried to blame her ? Inferring that she was part of ‘cancel culture’ (wow how I am hating that word) when as an adult she had privately expressed her viewpoints to him (and given he was a friend that must have been very painful to her)
I really thought that exposed him dreadfully – I only thought that teenagers pulled those sorts of stunts. It quite saddened me (more for Rebecca but also Lawrence)
Agree re: his career……..which is also a bit sad. I doubt too many actors will want to work with him. Not because of his opinions but his behaviour to Rebecca would certainly dent his prospects with future colleagues.
Fortunately it has not impacted my view of the series – I watched an old Lewis episode the other day and was easily able to separate the two.
Belated thank you for doing the book. I bought the kindle version and it works quite well. Now I need to watch Lewis again!
Three years later, and I just ordered the book! It takes three weeks to ship from the UK but I know it will be worth it. I have so enjoyed your insights as I made my way through Morse and Endeavor. I gave myself PBS Masterpiece on Prime for Christmas so now I can watch Lewis — with your companionship 🙂
Hello Holly. If you can, cancel the order. I will be publishing a second, more comprehensive, second edition very soon.
Will do — thanks for the heads up. Looking forward to it!
When can we expect this, Chris?
Hello David. I’m aiming for the end of February.
Took delivery of the book yesterday in readiness for when I start my Lewis rewatch. It’s been great watching the Morse episodes again and then reading the blog+comments, so will be interesting to read Chris’s writings per Lewis episode in the book. I look forward to the Endeavour book.
Thank you Mark.
Ooh this is exciting! I will have to order it. I have started at the beginning of Endeavour and realised I’d forgotten a lot of the earlier episodes, of course it is 11 years ago, and Lewis will be even longer.
Hello Louisa. I have a second edition of my Lewis book coming out soon, so I would wait for that before purchasing.