40. The Body in the Library (1942)

Good afternoon, Dame Agatha.  This is a cool, drizzly fall afternoon, perfect for cuddling up with a mystery - and I'm about to start one right after I write this.

I feel like I've read this book before and didn't get excited about it, although it isn't on my Goodreads shelf, so it hasn't been in the last 6 years.  This time I did greatly enjoy it.  Twisty as always - and no, I didn't know whodunit.

Loved this comment by little 9-year-old Peter (I have one of those!):  "I read them all (detective stories) and I've got autographs from Dorothy Sayers and Agatha Christie and Dickson Carr and HC Bailey."  *giggle*  I'm kind of surprised you didn't put yourself first.

Mark Gaskell looked at Miss Marple in a somewhat puzzled fashion. He said doubtfully, "Do you - er - write detective stories?" The most unlikely people, he knew, wrote detective stories. And Miss Marple, in her old-fashioned spinster's clothes, looked a singularly unlikely person.
     "Oh, no, I'm not clever enough for that."

How I love your sense of humor.  These quips are like Easter eggs.

Can't wait for the next,
b.

39. N or M? (1941)

Good morning, dear Agatha.

I finished this book a few days ago.  A nice ho-hum, uneventful, even pleasantly dull little book - until chapter 7.  I felt like you went from zero to 60 in that one chapter.  Suddenly things were moving.

War novels aren't my favorite, but funny enough I'm now reading All the Light We Cannot See for Loveland Loves to Read; the author is speaking here in town in a couple of weeks.  That said, the fact that there's a war in the background is about the only thing they have in common. :)

I love Tommy and Tuppence, and I've missed them.  I thought it was very creative and well done to bring them back, later in life, in a different chapter in history.  It felt right, if that makes sense.

And I love (although I'm worried about them because of their age) that at the end of the novel, these two people decided to adopt this little baby... essentially adopting from foster care, a system we've learned well in these last two years.

But, Agatha, what of this?

"No, if it isn't an accident, it must be loss of memory.  I believe that is far more common than is generally known, especially at times of stress like those we are living through now."

Uh huh.

A week until your birthday, Dame Agatha.  Mine was a few days ago.  Maybe next year we can do something together.  :)

b.

38. Evil Under the Sun (1941)

Dear Agatha,

It isn't you.  It's me.

I read this in 2013 and gave it 4 stars on Goodreads.  This time around, this read has taken me over a month!  I just couldn't get into it.  But really, I think it's me. 

Still it makes me smile, and I love statements such as this by Poirot:  "Ah! Madame, I reserve the explanations for the last chapter."  Yep, always.

I'm sorry I just don't have much to say, Agatha.  It's been a struggle of a week and I think that's why I've been too distracted to just read.  Looking forward to something new soon, though - N or M?

Still,
Beth

37. One, Two, Buckle My Shoe (1940)

{also known as The Patriotic Murders and An Overdose of Death}

Good morning, dear Agatha.  I finished this one a few days ago, but it's been such a busy week I haven't been able to get this post written.  As it is, I am headed to Cali in a few hours - not fully packed yet and much to do, so this might be a little on the brief side. 

Can I just say how much I love the cover art on this one?  I will have to come back and add a picture.  And a detective story centered around a DENTIST?  Who does that?  But some very valid points are made - you are completely off your guard in the dentist's chair!  And it humanizes Poirot nicely to know that even he is not a fan of dentists:

There are certain humiliating moments in the lives of the greatest of men.  It has been said that no man is a hero to his valet.  To that may be added that few men are heroes to themselves at the moment of visiting their dentist.

Me, too, Hercule.  Me, too.

Perhaps my favorite quote, though, is of Inspector Japp to Hercule Poirot:

"You're talking like a thriller by a lady novelist!"

I *love* that about you, Agatha - that you poke little bits of fun at yourself and your craft.

I hate it, but I have to run.  Always a pleasure!
b.

35. The Regatta Mystery (1939)

I goofed again.  I read Sad Cypress before The Regatta Mystery.  Back on track now, I think.

"What are the years from 20 to 40?  Fettered and bound by personal and emotional relationships. That's bound to be.  That's living.  But later there's a new stage.  You can think, observe life, discover something about other people and the truth about yourself. Life becomes real - significant. You see it as a whole.  Not just one scene - the scene you, as an actor, are playing.  No man or woman is actually himself (or herself) till after 45.  That's when individuality has a chance."  - Parker Pyne ("Problem at Pollensa Bay")

I really enjoyed this collection of short stories, dear Agatha.  Sometimes the short story works are not my favorite, nor is Parker Pyne a favorite of your characters, but I did still enjoy this book as a whole.  My favorite was probably "The Mystery of the Bagdad Chest," followed closely by "In a Glass Darkly."  No wait - maybe "Problem at Sea."  Or  "The Dream"!  They were all that good!

So yesterday I found myself downtown with an hour long wait and I forgot my book.  I downloaded it onto my phone and read one of the stories electronically.  The e-book was kind of cool because at the beginning of the stories, it had a brief note on when and where the stories were published.  With "In a Glass Darkly," it included this super cool nugget:

"... its very first public airing was on 6 April 1934 when Agatha Christie read the story on BBC Radio's National Programme.  No recording of this 15-minute performance is known to exist."

THAT would be something to hear!

Love,
Beth

36. Sad Cypress (1940)

How do I love thee, Dear Agatha? Let me count the ways...

I mean, really... there must be a thousand reasons why I love to read your "detective fiction."  (One is that you often refer to your characters reading too much of it.  It always makes me chuckle.)

This book was a quick read that took me awhile.  I have been away from Christies for some time, trying to finish the wonderful but oh-so-verbose The Lord of the Rings.  I'm headed out of town in a couple of weeks.  I might take a book with me but was leading toward reading some of the stuff on my Kindle instead - traveling lighter, I guess.  We shall see.  But back to Sad Cypress.

Five stars, Dame Agatha! because you snuck up on me and surprised me yet again.

I loved the connection to roses and The War of... I loved the mentions of current movies at the time.  I loved the tension between love and happiness and how both might not be found in the same person.  (And I'm glad, for I didn't necessarily love the character that Elinor loved.)  I loved this slightly different format - Poirot didn't gather all the involved into a study to explain how it all worked out. He was present and brilliant and saved the day, *and* he answered questions in the final chapter, but it was still different from before.

Loved every page, dear Agatha.  Thanks again.

Beth

34. And Then There Were None (1939)

{also published as Ten Little Indians}

First book I've read in one sitting in... years.

This.

Dear Agatha, I have always thought that The Murder of Roger Ackroyd was my favorite Christie.  Murder on the Orient Express is up, there, too.  But this... this book is different from any of the others I've read.

I'd almost classify it as horror or suspense rather than detective fiction.  Yes, there is a mystery to solve -- who exactly is U. N. Owen? - but it is solved in the context of ten people fighting for their lives.  That definitely brings a horror / suspense element to the normally cerebral cozy mystery that we are so used to from you.

Roger Ackroyd was written early on and certainly established your position as Queen of Deception, but the novels that followed were often formulaic (no criticism intended as I still can never guess the culprit!).  Then, somehow, you manage to do something so creative, so extraordinary with And Then There Were None - in the middle of it all.  It blows my mind simply that you published something like 5 novels in 1938 and 1939 - that alone is a feat of workmanship to be admired - but to come out with ATTWN in the middle? Astounding.

What else can I say?

I love that the mystery is not solved with the final chapter.  Or what you think is the solution is found not to be the solution in the epilogue.  It isn't until the final pages of the novel in one character's confession that everything is wrapped up neatly.  (If it weren't for that confession, we would have no solution!  What if...?)  Even structurally this book transcends norms.

Tonight we get to go see the stage version of the story.  I can't imagine how this will translate into a live production.  And I can't wait!

33. Easy to Kill (1939)

{also published as Murder is Easy}

(I like the American title of Easy to Kill better, dear Agatha.)

I *loved* this book.

It was really outrageous and shocking and twisty and fun.

And while you know I adore Hercule Poirot, it was certainly a nice break from his order and method - in favor of a new sleuth in town (a not very successful one, in the end, mind you) and the lovely heroine (who, as she said, would not die - although it was close!). 

A serial killer with no apparent pattern, no apparent links among the victims... Red herrings and twists and mentions of detective fiction and books and... what is not to love about this book?

And no typos, unlike the previous read. (Forgot to mention that, did I? It *annoys* the heck out of me, Agatha!)

Love!

me

PS:  Oh yeah - I started this book with the British edition on my Kindle.  (1) The title changed - not unusual - but (2) the British version has chapter titles while the American version does not.  Odd.  And (3) one of the main characters' name was changed from Pinkerton to Fullerton.  Hmmm...

PPS:  And... on my cover there is a picture of... someone.  Who?  Not sure, really.  It could be the creeper Ellsworthy (who made me think of Mr. Gold of Once Upon a Time) I guess.  Or maybe Miss Waynflete?  I don't know.  But I *love* the cover art that came up on my Goodreads post.

32. A Holiday for Murder (1939)

{also published as Murder for Christmas}

Dear Agatha,

What if Mrs. Boynton from Appointment with Death had hooked up with Simeon Lee from this book?  Holy cow - talk about dysfunctional families led by a sadistic figure.  This book actually felt very similar to AWD - hated head of the family dies, every member benefits, every family member a potential suspect.  Yet this one went a step further with another common theme of yours - people aren't who they say they are.

It wasn't until a chapter or two in that I realized I'd read this before - and what it was that made me remember was Lydia tending one of her creative garden landscapes.  I am blessed (or cursed, depending on the scenario) with a very bad memory, but it is a blessing when rereading books because I still didn't know the ending, the culprit, or anything!  But yeah - it was part of an anthology I'd picked up a few years ago called Murder for Christmas.

Anyway, dear friend (I would so like to consider you a friend, if I may), thanks again for the fun.  I love to hang out with you and hear your stories.

Always,
Beth

31. Appointment with Death (1938)

Ah, Dame Agatha ~

This novel felt so different to me, at least in the first half.  You really spent that half of the novel in a psychological work-up of the victim that I did find fascinating.  Like Ratchett in Murder on the Orient Express, the "victim" was a despicable human being who, by most accounts deserved to die (although I agree with Poirot - that the despicableness of the person does not warrant our playing God and Judge on their life).

That first half - the psychological study, so to speak, of the Boynton family - is one of the three things I loved about this book.  To be more exact, I'm not really referring to the story so much as the devices I guess.

I love, dear Agatha, when you reference your other works / Poirot's other cases.  Maybe that's not something exclusive to you, but it reinforces this fictitious world as being ... well ... real.  It's like your characters believe (and it makes me grin every time) that *they* are the real world and not fictitious at all.  

Colonel Carbury:  "We might have known he'd be out of it. Being, as in detective stories, the most likely person..." 

   "You read the detective stories, yes?"

   "'Thousands of them,' said Colonel Carbury.  He added, and his tone was that of a wistful schoolboy: "I suppose you couldn't do the things the detective does in books? Write a list of significant facts - things that don't seem to mean anything but are really frightfully important - that sort of thing?"

"Ah, said Poirot kindly. "You like that kind of detective story? But certainly, I will do it for you with pleasure."

I like *that* kind of detective story, too.  * wink *  Also:

"Your position certainly seems impeccable," said Poirot with gravity. "In a work of fiction you would strongly be suspected on that account."

I love your sense of humor, Agatha. Those references to the detective stories make me chuckle, and the references to other cases - the ABC murders, the Orient Express, and Shiatana from Cards on the Table... I just love it.

I'm trying to read these few Christies quickly as I'm seeing And Then There Were None on stage in 9 days and I'm nearly to that book.  I *really* want to read it beforehand and in order.  I've only ever played the video game!  That said, time to get moving on the next...

30. Murder in the Mews (1937)

{also published as Dead Man's Mirror}

(I wonder how it is chosen which short story or novella after which the collection will be named.)

So, dear Agatha, guess what?!

A local theater here is doing And Then There Were None at the end of April.  I am honestly just as excited about seeing it as I am about seeing P!nk in May!  Robert and I are going with Joshua, his girlfriend Nyx, and Christianne.  We just got the tickets last week.

And then I looked at my reading plan and saw that ATTWN is only about 5 books out!  If I book it (haha, pun intended), then I can have it read before we see the play.  Apparently I've not read it!  Even Josh has read it, for some reason.  I have played the PC game, though!

The only dilemma is that I'd just begun Lord of the Rings (to read "with" Josh, although he's way ahead of me), and I have 3 "optional" books to read before the conference I'm attending in mid-April, less than a month away.  Oh yeah, and it's tax season.  And the house is falling apart.  And I could really use one of those nurse/nanny types that you always had to help with your ONE child (remember I have FOUR)... but I digress.

Enjoyed every one of these 4 shorts and I couldn't even pick a favorite.  Learned a few new words along the way - mews (wasn't what a I thought it was), gasper, saloon car, baronet, and more.  I enjoyed seeing familiar friends - Sattherthwaite and Japp.  And I loved that the twisted endings - probably "Triangle at Rhodes" caught me most.

Thank you again, Dame Agatha.

Love,
me

29. Death on the Nile (1937)

This could also be titled The Love Boat, or maybe even What Happens on the Karnak Stays on the Karnak.  Yes, I'm chuckling to myself.

*spoiler alert*

At the end of this book, a number of family secrets and "lesser" crimes are hushed up ("Race sighed. 'That's all right,' he said. 'This is the Hush Hush House.'"), four people are engaged to be married, and five people are dead.  You've got to admit, it has all the makings of a Hollywood movie.  Oh, and looky there - they *are* making a new one to debut in November 2019, following the success of last year's Murder on the Orient Express.

(Actually, as I searched Google for the details on the new movie, I was surprised to find that the 1978 movie version has Angela Lansbury in it!  How I love Angela - another Dame, if I'm not mistaken!  I will have to find this version soon and give it a watch!)

One disappointment in this read - and it had nothing to do with the novel itself.  I was searching my friend Google again to understand a phrase, and my eyes inadvertently traveled to a paragraph revealing the culprit of the story.  I was bummed to know this up front as I was only about 1/3 of the way through the book.  Still... it was fun to see how it turned out, as the solution seemed impossible.

I was talking to Joshua just yesterday I believe about how at times some of your personal experiences and ideas come through in your story.  I talked about how you seemed to admire, if not share, Max's love for archeology and how that was sometimes a backdrop in your stories.  In this one, archeology has nothing to do with the story, and yet it does drop in, with this beautiful description by Poirot of the methodology of solving a mystery:

"Once I went professionally to an archaeological expedition - and I learnt something there.  In the course of an excavation, when something comes up out of the ground, everything is cleared away very carefully all around it. You take away the loose earth, and you scrape it here and there with a knife until finally your object is there, all alone, ready to be drawn and photographed with no extraneous matter confusing it.  That is what I have been seeking to do - clear away the extraneous matter so that we can see the truth - the naked shining truth."

One final comment - this may have been obvious, but I only just realized in this novel what a foil Colonel Race is to Captain Hastings.

Thanks again for the ride, Dame Agatha.  Always a pleasure.

The Agatha Christie Book Club (CA Larmer)

Dear Dame Agatha,

Joshua is taking a Tolkien class at UNC and so I downloaded The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings onto my Kindle to read along with him.  Generally, I think I still prefer a physical book, but the size of TLOTR made me think the e-version would be easier to manage.  Anyway, I finished The Hobbit last week and was scrolling through the many, many unread titles I have on my Kindle and came across this one - The Agatha Christie Book Club by CA Larmer.  Figured I'd have a little fun reading before I get back to diligently working through your writings, and this one was a lot of fun.  I don't remember getting it and don't have the gumption right now to go through my Amazon records to see when it was.  (I am really enjoying re-discovering my Kindle again, though!)

So this book...

You know how on American Idol when the judges would always criticize people for singing covers of certain artists because there's no way, they say, it would do the original justice?  They always said that for people like Celine Dion, Whitney Houston, and Alicia Keys.  That was in the back of my mind when I wondered about how Larmer would handle taking this on - not that she was trying to write a Christie, per se, but I'm sure she wanted to do you justice.

In that way, I think the author did well.  This is *not* Christie (in caliber or mimicry), but it was reminiscent of Christie in the twists and turns and the handling of the clues and thus I think was a nice tip-of-the hat or homage or however you want to put it... I enjoyed the plot quite a bit and at some point I think I will check out book two in the series.

It was interesting, being Australian - some of the slang was new to me.

I loved all the different Christie novels referenced - Orient Express, Blue Train, Cat Among Pigeons, Mysterious Affair at Styles...

Larmer's mention of Eleven Missing Days by CG Johnson intrigued me - I've looked it up on Amazon and find a similar title by a Jared Cade, but not Johnson (author error, artistic license, or different book?) - and I'm definitely going to be checking that out.

The one thing I could have lived without in this book was the subplot of Claire's fiance.  Is that what a "modern" mystery is - including the cultural approval of homosexuality?  I just felt like it didn't need to be there, regardless of what I think about homosexuality.  Actually, all the references to Perry's flatmate and his quite active sex life - I could have lived without.  Even the relationship of Alicia and her crush Anders was kept quite innocent and endearing.  Maybe I'm a prude, I don't know; I just didn't think it contributed much at all to the main plot.

I wonder if you would have liked this book, though, Agatha?  Larmer uses your real-life mystery to figure more heavily into the plot than the actual mysteries you wrote about.  I wonder what you would have thought about that, particularly since you didn't speak much of your disappearance in your own autobiography.  I hadn't heard much of the details that were referenced from EMD.  It's interesting, anyway.

Anyway, Agatha, I'll be back to your works shortly.

Always,
Beth

28. Dumb Witness (1937)

{also published as Poirot Loses a Client, Mystery at Littlegreen House, and Murder at Littlegreen House}

(I like the title Dumb Witness best.)

Dear Agatha,

Just simply a fun read. 


So this is a wire haired terrier.  Funny mention by Hastings of him needing to be "plucked."  This is how I envision Bob, which is, by the way, a silly name for the thing.  Don't you think something like Spanky or Whipper or even Sherlock would have been cuter? 

But that's about all I didn't care for.  Every thing else, as usual, is en pointe.  I especially loved the way you captured the character of Miss Emily Arundell even though she was with us in this life for only a few chapters.  I especially loved the way I could almost hear her talking and understand her agitation in the letter she wrote to Poirot.

Interesting... when the Sisters Trippe came on the scene, all I did was smirk a little at their foolishness.  Had I asked myself what was the purpose of including the spiritualism in the novel at all - had I employed my own little gray cells - perhaps I, too, might have deduced the murderer.

Well, not likely.  But perhaps the method?  Yeah, still not likely.

Anyhoo... Thank you for the fun, Dame Agatha.

Always,
Beth