For our Siblings Book Club last year, we read Agatha Christie‘s The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, which I think we all summarily enjoyed. This year we’ve also got on the docket Christie’s A Pocket Full of Rye, and I think we’re all glad for it. Although my parents have been mystery fans for as long as I can remember, I never really caught the mystery bug. I enjoy thrillers and youth fiction more than anything when it comes to my taste in novels, but I’m always willing to try something new.

Now I’m the kind of guy that wants to read books about the locations to which I’m traveling, especially if it’s ever my first time in an area. So when I took a trip to Africa in February, I tried to read whatever I could about placed like Uganda and Kenya. Such books were not easy to find! But I persisted and found a few, though I decided that I also wanted to read more than just non-fiction works like The Price of Stones (set in Uganda) and The Gifts of Africa. When I perused my catalogue of novels set in Africa, Death on the Nile popped up, and since I was to be passing through Jinja, Uganda, the headwaters of the Nile River itself, I knew this would be an optimal piece to read it.

The story follows detective Hercule Poirot on a bit of a holiday in Egypt upon a small boat cruise up the Nile River where, shocker of all shockers, a murder takes place. The cast of characters on this small boat range from fashionable celebrities to lawyers to revolutionaries, professors, the unemployed—and their mothers. And of course, also included in this ensemble is the world’s most infamous detective. Oddly enough, all of the people on this boat have things in common, threads that bind their lives together, making everyone a suspect following the murder, yet no one capable of unraveling the knots. No one, that is, except Poirot.

I don’t intentionally try to solve mysteries while I’m reading, them, though I certainly can’t help my subconscious from asking questions and recognizing the flaws in doubtful scenarios or scenes that spring up during Poirot’s investigations. I will say that my subconscious didn’t see the solution to this murder coming, so Christie’s red herrings were successful against me this time around.

Throughout my read of this book, I highlighted some wonderful lines, like this colorful description of attitude: “All three wore the air of superiority assumed by people who are already in a place when studying new arrivals” (58). Here’s a few other great ones:

A Lesson in Love

“Love is not everything, Mademoiselle,” Poirot said gently. “It is only when we are young that we think it is.” (91)

A Lesson in Detective Work

“Motives for murder are sometimes very trivial, Madame.”   “What are the most usual motives, Monsieur Poirot?”   “Most frequent – money. That is to say, gain in its various ramifications. Then there is revenge – and love, and fear, and pure hate, and beneficence.” (119)

A Spot of Humor

He escorted her gallantly to the door and came back wiping his brow. “What a poisonous woman! Whew! Why didn’t somebody murder her?” “It may yet happen,” Poirot consoled him. (271)

I really enjoyed this book, and while I know I don’t have the bandwidth to read many more of Christie’s vast bibliography, I’m looking forward to whatever other titles people recommend as must-reads. She’s a great escape.

©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)