Reading - wider world 3 - unit 8

Read the text below about detective series on TV. Decide if the sentences are True, False, or Doesn’t say. 

Switch on any TV channel nowadays and the chances are there’ll be a detective series showing. Some of them, like Sherlock Holmes, are based on a well-known fictional detective from books. Others are created specially for television. 

The detectives in crime series can be from books or created by TV writers.

But wherever the stories come from, the programmes are very popular, and they’re watched by millions of people in many countries all around the world. And some of the programmes can be twenty years old, yet they’re still shown regularly on TV channels, and get large audiences. And a new generation of viewers is enjoying detective series just as much.

Detective series are more popular in some countries than in others. 

But wherever the stories come from, the programmes are very popular, and they’re watched by millions of people in many countries all around the world. And some of the programmes can be twenty years old, yet they’re still shown regularly on TV channels, and get large audiences. And a new generation of viewers is enjoying detective series just as much.

Even older shows can still attract lots of viewers.

But wherever the stories come from, the programmes are very popular, and they’re watched by millions of people in many countries all around the world. And some of the programmes can be twenty years old, yet they’re still shown regularly on TV channels, and get large audiences. And a new generation of viewers is enjoying detective series just as much.

Younger people seem to like detective shows more than older people.

Yet why are these detective stories so popular? They all involve crimes of some kind, and in real life they wouldn’t be easy to read about in the newspapers. But perhaps because they’re in a TV show, they don’t have the same effect on us any more.

Some of the stories in detective shows are similar to crime stories in newspapers.

Or perhaps the best aspect of the show is that while you’re watching, you can try to work out who committed the crime – and solve it more quickly than the detective! That’s always fun – but sometimes it’s not possible because the detective reveals something at the last minute that we couldn’t possibly know – and then we feel disappointed!

There are plenty of clues to allow the viewers to solve the crime.

Crime fiction books are also popular too. Years ago they weren’t seen as very serious literature, but now more and more people are buying them and enjoying them. And the quality of the writing has grown enormously. Happy reading!

Crime fiction is much better than it used to be.