Poirot and Jeeves join in Waterstones sleepover

Detective Hercule Point and butler Jeeves joined guests at a sleepover event in Waterstones’ flagship store on Saturday (26th October).

Altogether 19 guests spent 12 hours overnight in the bookshop at an event organised after the company hit the headlines when an American tourist got locked in Waterstones Trafalgar Square and later had to be let out by police.

Sandra Taylor, the new head of events and external relations for Waterstones, decided to turn the incident, which gained a lot traction on social media, into an event for bookshop fans, many of who spoke on Twitter about how it would be their “dream” to be locked in a bookshop over night.

Tickets to the sleepover were advertised on the travel website Airbnb and the 10 competition winners and their guests were treated to welcome drinks before a tour of the grade 1 listed Waterstones Piccadilly building.

Taylor said: “Along the way we were joined by two very special characters from literature – Poirot and Jeeves. Poirot, a lookalike, read from Sophie Hannah’s Monogram Murders (HarperCollins) and an actor playing Jeeves read from Jeeves and the Yule-Tide Spirit and other stories by P.G. Wodehouse. Over pizza and snacks, sleep tips were then given by Professor Richard Wiseman, author of Night School (Pan Macmillan.)  Guests were then free to discover our eight and a half miles of books for themselves.”

Taylor added: “Highlights of the evening included a chess game at 4a.m. in the Russian Bookshop! After breakfast was served at 8am on Saturday morning in Café W…our book-loving guests left a little bleary-eyed but with big smiles on their faces after a memorable bookish experience!”

She described the event as “a great success”.