TV Pick of the Week: A Good Girl's Guide to Murder - review by Yvette Huddleston

Studious sixth former Pip is studying for her A levels and for her extended exam project during the summer holidays she decides to investigate a local cold case. Five years earlier in her picturesque small hometown of Little Kilton, popular local high school student Andie Bell (India Lillie Davies) went missing. Sometime later her boyfriend Sal Singh (Rahul Pattni) confessed to her murder but Andie’s body was never found and Sal was discovered dead, an apparent suicide, before the case could go to trial. Sal was the police’s only suspect, but Pip has never believed that he was guilty of the crime and is determined to prove his innocence.

Despite the misgivings of her best friend Cara (Asha Banks) who advises her against stirring things up again, Pippa sets out to find out what actually happened and begins by conducting interviews with people who were connected with Andie in some way, including her two best friends and others in their friendship group. Among those she approaches is Sal’s brother Ravi (Zain Iqbal) who is initially unwilling to cooperate but who eventually agrees to help and becomes Pip’s investigative partner.

Before long the pair are uncovering a number of secrets, lies and cover-ups that have prevented the truth from coming to light. It seems that Andie was living something of a double life, that she may have been involved in drug dealing and that she had a secret older lover. A list of possible suspects begins to emerge and Pip and Ravi’s detective work starts to threaten to put them both in danger…

Director Dolly Wells wisely keeps the action moving along at a cracking pace. The setting is extremely photogenic and the camping trips, tennis matches and garden parties sometimes invokes a charming modern-day Famous Five feel, while the narrative contains plenty of intriguing twists and turns to keep the audience engaged. The top-quality performances from the young cast are all very natural and they bring bags of energy to the cracking storytelling. All this plus some very classy supporting turns from Anna Maxwell Martin and Gary Beadle as Pip’s mother and stepfather and Matthew Baynton as her best friend Cara’s widowed dad.