After the Funeral - Agatha Christie

"Not that Poirot was really looking for evidence - he wanted only to satisfy himself as to possibilities. The murder of Richard Abernathie could only be a hypothesis. It was Cora Lansquenet's murder for which evidence was needed. What he wanted was to study the people who have been assembled for the funeral that day, and to form his own conclusions about them." - Pg. 164-165

I am always amazed at how Agatha Christie is able to come up with a different approach to each of her books. In After the Funeral, she is able to develop a tale where the evidence is merely the characters themselves.  There are a few pieces of traditional evidence,  but by in large, she uses them as distractions. 

Mrs. McGinty's Dead - Agatha Christie

I have been a huge Agatha Christie/Hercule Poirot fan for many years. Today, I just finished her 25th novel using him as her main character - "Mrs. McGinty's Dead".

Poirot is approached by police Superintendent Spence - whom he has worked with previously. Spence worked to put a man, James Bentley, away for the violent murder of his landlady because of the evidence. James Bentley is now to be put to death for the crime. However, Spence is not convinced that the personality of the man he arrested could ever be brought to the point of murdering another person. Hercule Poirot agrees to look into the killing by moving into the small town of Broadhinny. In classic Christie fashion, Poirot begins to find bits and pieces of non-traditional evidence and psychology that may indicate that the true murderer is still living in the small town. Poirot even comes face to face with his own death while pursuing the truth.

Taken at the Flood - Agatha Christie

"There is one thing I should like to know very much," Poirot mused. "Why is Rosaleen Cloade afraid? It is for her life that she is afraid... I think that this, " replied Poirot. "Rosaleen is twenty-six. She may live to be seventy. She may live longer still. Forty-four years, let us say. Don't you think, Superintendent, that forty-four years may be too long for someone to contemplate?" - from Taken at the Flood, by Agatha Christie

There is a tide in the affairs of men,
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
On such a full sea are we now afloat,
And we must take the current when it serves,
Or lose our ventures.

- from Julius Ceasar by William Shaespeare

Recent Reads

The Hollow - Agatha Christie

    "Gerda had not been happy at school. At school there had been even less reassurance than elsewhere. Home had been better. But even home had not been very good. For they had all, of course, been quicker and more clever than she was. Their comments, quick, impatient, not quite unkind, had whistled about her ears like a hailstorm: 'Oh, do be quick, Gerda.' 'Butterfingers, give it to me!' 'Oh, don't let Gerda do it, she'll be ages. 'Gerda never takes in anything...'
     Hadn't they seen, all of them, that that was the way to make her slower and more stupid still? She'd got worse and worse, more clumsy with her fingers, more slow-witted, more inclined to stare vacantly when something was said to her.
     Until, suddenly, she had reached the point where she had found a way out... Almost accidentally, really, she found her weapon of defence (sic).
     She had grown slower still, her puzzled stare had become even more blank. But now, when they said impatiently, 'Oh, Gerda, how stupid you are, don't you understand that?' she had been able, behind her blank expression, to hug herself a little in her secret knowledge... For she wasn't quite as stupid as they thought... Often, when she pretended not to understand, she did understand. And often, deliberately, she slowed down in her task of whatever it was, smiling to herself when someones impatient fingers snatched it away from her.
     For, warm and delightful, was a secret knowledge of superiority. She began to be, quite often, a little amused... Yes, it was amusing to know more than they thought you knew. To be able to do a thing, but not let anybody know that you could do it.
     And it had the advantage, suddenly discovered, that people often did things for you. That, of course, saved you a lot of trouble. And, in the end, if people got into the habit of doing things for you, you didn't have to do them at all, and then people didn't know that you did them badly. And so, slowly, you came round again almost to where you started. To feeling that you could hold your own on equal terms with the world at large."

pg. 36-37

Hercules Poirot’s Christmas

I really did spend part of my Christmas with Hercule Poirot! It just happens that he was in the book (Hercules Poirot’s Christmas) that I was reading on my way to and from Vietnam… I had to go and renew my visa… changing it to a business visa so that I could continue to teach in Cambodia… here is what happened…

Poirot was visiting a friend of his when he was asked to look into the gruesome murder of an elderly millionaire over the Christmas holiday. As with all of his cases, nothing came easily… to start off with, there was a tremendous amount of crashing about and a horrid scream that emanated inside the dead man's room at the time of the murder… however, when the only door to the room was opened, all of the windows were bolted shut from the inside, and no one was inside except the dead man Simeon Lee… Lee's unloving demeanor and greed gave all of his family members cause to put him away… but who actually did it? When the house staff are cleared of wrong doing, it leaves only Lee's family that could have killed him… no one feels like sharing any good wishes this holiday season, except Hercule Poirot, who always believes that truth and conviction are among the best of gifts…

Who is Poirot?

For those of you who have often wondered what Poirot is... here is the trailer from the BBC TV show...

Appointment with Death

"You do see, don't you that she has to be killed?"

Again in Appointment with Death, Agatha Christie comes through with a new and interesting motives for death... and the book starts with what may be her most intriguing opening line (see above)... an American family traveling in the Middle East is plagued by their dominating mother... after establishing why each person wants her to die (and that they could be in it together), Hercule Poirot comes to the aid of the police to show why it could only be one person...

Dumb Witness

One of Agatha Christie's books has waffled between two titles: Dumb Witness (also known as Poirot Loses A Client)... and neither of the titles makes a lot of sense in relation to the story... I know that the A and E version of Dumb Witness makes use of the terrier (the dumb, non speaking, witness) and makes a lot of sense, but in the book the dog just shows up from time to time... the movie actually makes use of the dog helping Poirot to put the pieces together... the movie is beautifully done, and the book is great as well, but it just paints a different picture... nevertheless, Christie is a genius, and this book is another example. I used to have the idea that she didn't tell the reader anything until the end of the book, but that is simply not true... she is the genius of credibly accusing as many as a dozen different characters of the crime, and then wrapping it up with Poirot's genius... read and enjoy...