I’ve got quite a backlog of books to review, and in that stack is another gem of a read from our 2022 Siblings Book Club, this Hercule Poirot mystery by Agatha Christie, which we all were quite excited to read. I had watched many a Masterpiece Theatre with my mother growing up and so was at one point familiar with the David Suchet version of Poirot, but I’ve read very little of the mystery genre, so this was certainly new for me.
When I read a mystery novel or watch a mystery thriller, I’m usually the guy who goes along for the ride without trying to guess the culprit throughout. Sure, I get my inklings, but more often than not I’m just eating up the red herrings the author’s feeding me. I like it that way. This time, though, since we’re in a book club and we occasionally discuss the books we’re reading, my brother (who’d finished it already) asked me and my nephew (who was about halfway through, like me) what our hunches might be. I threw out one red-herring name but then voiced my gut-feeling—-which I quickly rejected as nonsense. Turns out my gut was right. Woops. Never ask me to solve a murder.
The story itself was unique in that Poirot interacts with the author and even at one point reads his manuscript, which I found a fascinating plot point. I don’t much about her other books, but if they involve such interactions like this which help amp up the characterizations, I’m all for it.
Despite the fact that Agatha Christie was a constant feature in our home growing up, the extent of my personal experience with her in book form before this had been singular, in Hercule Poirot’s Christmas (1938). Somehow, I could sense a disparity in time as I read The Murder of Roger Ackroyd. In this book, Hercule Poirot has just retired, and he speaks longingly of his assistant Hastings and how well he had served him over the years, yet something about the way she wrote it made me think that he’s a world-famous detective not because he’s got sixty books and cases to his name already, but because Agatha Christie has just said he’s a world-famous detective—and someday she’ll prove it.
In perusing the very useful website www.bookseriesinorder.com, I realized that Ackroyd is only the fourth Poirot mystery published, and there were 34 more published after it. But then I noticed that 17 Poirot short stories or novellas predated 1926 with 22 more being published after the fact, so by 1926, I suppose he really did have quite a repertoire of cases solved—though he was by no means nearing retirement!
It was great to add this family-favorite author to our Siblings Book Club in 2022, and something tells me she’ll be an annual favorite from here on out. In fact, a Miss Marple case has been added to our list for 2023, A Pocket Full of Rye, so we’re all looking forward to that…not because murder is so great to read about, but justice. At least that’s what we’re telling ourselves.
©2023 E.T.
Read More from Agatha Christie:
- The Murder of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie (1926)
- Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie (1937)
- Hercule Poirot’s Christmas by Agatha Christie (1938)
- A Pocket Full of Rye by Agatha Christie (1953)