Book #119 of 2024: While the Light Lasts and Other Stories by Agatha Christie Unless I’m mistaken, I have now reached the end of my long journey through author Agatha Christie’s considerable body of novels and short story collections. In fact, this particular anthology was actually published in 1997, substantially after her 1976 death, but …
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Book #86 of 2024: Curtain: Poirot’s Last Case by Agatha Christie (Hercule Poirot #44) This final Hercule Poirot novel is not one of the better mysteries in its series, relying as it does on an implausible understanding of psychology for a serial killer’s eventually revealed motivation and means. It can also be frustrating to read, …
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Book #63 of 2024: Elephants Can Remember by Agatha Christie (Hercule Poirot #42) This is the last Hercule Poirot novel that Agatha Christie wrote, although it would be followed in publication by Curtain, which she’d completed decades earlier and kept locked away in a vault. It’s an odd story, with a rather obvious twist and …
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Book #30 of 2024: Hallowe’en Party by Agatha Christie (Hercule Poirot #41) This isn’t necessarily the worst Agatha Christie story, but it’s certainly one of her more repugnant ones. Multiple characters are casually racist, ableist, and homophobic, often to the point of spouting eugenic beliefs about certain people’s predisposition to violence, which come alongside their …
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Book #133 of 2023: Third Girl by Agatha Christie (Hercule Poirot #40) A fine mid-1960s title from author Agatha Christie, although at this point she’s clearly struggling to understand the contemporary counterculture youth movement. So there’s some silly depictions of nihilistic young people and their supposed drug habits throughout, and the mystery itself hinges on …
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Book #100 of 2023: The Clocks by Agatha Christie (Hercule Poirot #39) This novel is a bit all over the place, and not just because the narrative switches back and forth between first-person and various third-person perspectives. Author Agatha Christie could write good mysteries and good spy thrillers, but she seems to run into trouble …
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Book #77 of 2023: Double Sin and Other Stories by Agatha Christie An odd little collection, published in 1961 (and then only in the US) but including stories from as far back as 1925. Three of the eight entries had even been previously released in other Agatha Christie volumes — “The Last Seance” in 1933’s …
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Book #55 of 2023: The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding and a Selection of Entrées by Agatha Christie The criteria for inclusion in author Agatha Christie’s short story collections is often somewhat haphazard, and in the case of this 1960 publication, it turns out that I’ve read four of the six entries elsewhere already (or …
Book #44 of 2023: Cat Among the Pigeons by Agatha Christie (Hercule Poirot #36) I like the espionage hijinks of this novel, although the plot never reaches the thrills of author Agatha Christie’s stories that are more focused in that domain, such as those in her Tommy and Tuppence series. And the setting of a …
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Book #200 of 2022: Dead Man’s Folly by Agatha Christie (Hercule Poirot #28) This is a fairly standard Agatha Christie mystery, notable mainly for stumping her retired Belgian detective for several weeks, during which time he retreats from the rural crime scene to sulk in frustration at home before an ultimately triumphant return to solve …
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