By Neil Durham

WORTH A LOOK?: ****

WHEN? Monday 14 July, series drops from 16 July 2025 RUNTIME: Each of 6 episodes is 60 minutes

Gabriel Book is the name of the new detective creation by Mark Gatiss (The Motive And The Cue, National Theatre) who runs a London book shop in 1946 while not solving crime.

• Read on for reasons including how Bookish is fiendishly clever, hugely funny and tremendously moving

He’s gay and in a ‘lavender marriage’ meaning he and his wife Trottie played by Polly Walker (Line Of Duty) are childhood friends rather than lovers which protects both from an unforgiving world.

Episode 1 – Slightly Foxed – begins with them taking in Connor Finch’s Jack straight out of Whitechapel Prison to assist in the store for reasons that are at 1st not entirely clear.

Book has a close relationship with Elliot Levey’s (Giant, Royal Court Theatre) Inspector Bliss and all he has to do is to mention his letter from Winston Churchill if nemesis policeman played by Blake Harrison (Waitress, Adelphi Theatre) challenges his right to question a witness or investigate a crime scene.

Gatiss, who stars, created and wrote Bookish, explains: ‘I’ve always wanted to play a detective, love the genre and about 8 years ago put together a wish-list of what I’d like to do which included exploring a lavender marriage in a world where women had been massively liberated, the government was radical but the world was totally smashed up.’

Walker says of Trottie: ‘She provides a warm, maternal home from which Book can solve the crimes. She’s a very independent woman in a loving marriage but not a conventional 1.’

Gatiss adds: ‘She has her own dalliances and everyone’s OK with that. The marriage protected both of them and we meet one of Trottie’s boyfriends later on which doesn’t go very well.’

Each story is told within 2 hour-long episodes which means we have a chance to get to know the back stories of all the characters and in Slightly Foxed we meet a young Gabriel and Trottie bonding over a confiscated book.

The series is shown on the U&Alibi channel and will be available as a boxset to Sky and Virgin subscribers. The channel has such faith in the show a 2nd series starts shooting this summer.

Gatiss seems particularly pleased with the show’s soundtrack which he descibes as boasting ‘fat synthesizers’ and techno.

He describes Book’s friendly relationship with the police as a choice: ‘I can’t bear that thing where the detective solves the crime and the policeman says: ‘I’ll give you 1 last chance …’

The 2nd story in the show is set in a film studio and the 3rd in a hotel although filming took place in Brussels rather than London because of the tax breaks.

Bookish is exactly the sort of show that we think should be on primetime BBC1 but do seek it out if you can because Gatiss is 1 of this country’s finest character actors and his writing is fiendishly clever, hugely funny and tremendously moving often all at the same time.

• Main pictures via Facebook courtesy BFI/Bookish Tickets
• Have you seen a Mark Gatiss show before and what do you think of this 1? Let us know what you thought in the comments below
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