What: paperbackWhat else: First person narrativeWherefore: it was on Mount TBR, and my Kindle was acting up Hastings: "I admit," I said, "that a second murder in a book often cheers things up."Poirot has semi-retired, but has discovered he is no better suited to the state than Holmes is said to have been, and so lets it be known that he is available to take those cases that interest him (again, like Holmes). At the beginning of this tale Hastings has come home to England from his ranch in Argentina, and expresses his hopes that some interesting case might pop up while he's there. And, of course, it does. Though it does not necessarily seem that way at first. Poirot receives an odd letter – printed, in common ink on common paper, and a postmark unremarkable – which proposes a challenge for the great mind. It's cheeky, and mildly insulting to the famous detective, and is signed "A.B.C.", and indicates that something is going to happen on a specific day in a specific town, and let's just see how clever you are! Hastings pooh-poohs the letter as one of those things written by some random crazy person, but Poirot is troubled by it. Something does indeed happen on that day in that town: an elderly woman is found murdered in her tobacco shop. Poirot, uneasy, heads to the crime scene. Hastings makes no bones about how utterly bored he is with the mere "sordid murder of an old woman". It's because the killer seems to be obvious – if Poirot hadn't received the letter there would never have been any question about it. And it's also because the victim is dull. A sordid domestic dispute is the only reason an older woman would be murdered. Bo-ring. This was about when I realized how little I like Hastings. I don't know if Christie was purposely using the smart Holmes-stupid Watson template, but Watson was never this thick, and would have given a damn about the death of an old woman, whether it was a case deserving of a great detective or not. As it turns out, this is deserving: the woman's name, her shop name, and her town all begin with "A". Then another letter comes directing Poirot's attention to a town beginning with "B". Uh oh. And sure enough, the victims begin to pile up, in strict alphabetical order. I've never been a big Poirot fan. I don't know if it's the prissiness or the accent or the little grey cells or the mustache or what, but I'll take Miss Marple any time, scary as she can be. In fact, I pulled this off the shelf because I would have sworn it was a Miss M. Oops. Still, the story was fun – except for one thing, which will be a spoiler I'll mark as such in the last paragraph of this review. It was as though Christie made up her mind to make this a very thorough departure from the usual plot, and had some fun playing with her serial killer. She also had fun with her secondary characters. A few of them – one victim's sister, another's niece, the official investigators – were lovely, with a surprising amount of life for minor characters in a fairly short book. I liked the attitudes taken toward the string of crimes. Poirot is grave; Hastings is confused (no surprise there); Japp and the other professional investigators are grimly determined to stop this string of sequential murders before it gets too far into the alphabet. "I", they figure. Hopefully "H". They're just being realistic, but the apparent callousness of it is breathtaking, like the tv crime shows where the detectives are seen joking over the corpse (*cough*Rizzoli and Isles*cough*). The solution is the part that bothered me – and here comes a big fat spoiler (though it's who the killer is not rather than who it is). (view spoiler)[The actual identity of the actual murderer was fairly satisfying. It was the fact that the narrative often broke away from Hastings's first-person journal entries to follow an unknown about for a little while in the most incriminating manner – that was what annoyed me. In a way, the poor man was so obviously the murderer that it was obvious he was not the murderer, if you know what I mean; however, it felt like being lied to when it became clear just how innocent he was, and I'm not sure if there was any evidence that would lead an armchair detective to figure out who, in fact, dunnit. I generally dislike murder mysteries in which the narrative departs from the usual point of view to show the story from the killer's angle; on the whole I'd rather stay with the hunters full time. (hide spoiler)]
I recently read a biography of Agatha Christie and it gave me a hankering to read one of hers I had never tried. I've heard The A. B. C. Murders called one of her best, so I thought I'd give it a shot. I thoroughly enjoyed myself from beginning to end, and goodness this was a fast read--just a few hours. It's a short novel, and Christie is very dialogue heavy and undemanding, so her books zip right along. I was amused early on by the little jokes about the detective novel in the repartee between Captain Hastings and Hercule Poirot. Very meta. If you haven't read Christie before, freakish as that might be, well Poirot is her most famous detective, along Sherlock Holmes lines, and Hastings is his Watson. Hastings strikes me as much dimmer than Watson though. I know sometimes Watson has been portrayed in film adaptations and pastiches as none-too-bright, but I don't think that's true to the original. It's only he's merely brilliant while Holmes is a genius who outranks not just Watson but the ordinary reader. Hastings though is the quintessential unreliable narrator, and the reader is usually far ahead of him, and some of the humor in the novel is seeing how he misreads so much. Two well-known films have been made from novels featuring Poirot: Murder on the Orient Express and Death on the Nile, which are among the novels acknowledged as Christies' best. Certainly Murder on the Orient Express is one of my own favorites, one of those where my jaw dropped at the solution of the mystery--where I felt I couldn't believe she just did that, but had to admit Christie played fair. I'd say the same of And Then There Were None (and though some famously disagreed) The Murder of Roger Ackroyd. For me The A. B. C. Murders, though fun, didn't have that jaw-dropping quality--I guessed the murderer very, very early and picked up just about every clue Poirot mentioned in his reveal. I'm not sure that's because Christie wasn't at the top of her game or I'm particularly clever though. I'm pretty sure I've seen this twist lifted and used in more than one television drama--and if you guess the basic premise, then everything follows. So even though this was enjoyable, I can't quite place this among the standouts by Christie I've read that I've rated five stars. Although if I could give it at least a 3 and a half on Goodreads, I would. (And for the record my absolute favorite isn't among the ones mentioned above but Death Comes At the End, Christie's sole historical mystery set in Ancient Egypt.)
What do You think about The A.B.C. Murders (2006)?
I got 10 of these books for my birthday, so there might be a few reviews in the foreseeable future. I grew up reading Agatha Christie, and to this day she's one of my go-to authors when I want a comfy, interesting and straight-to-the-chase book. This one is very good. Poirot is at his best and for once directly involved in the murders, as the murderer contacts him beforehand. I had an inkling of where the story would be headed, but I hadn't figured it out before the big reveal. It will keep you guessing, and though some of you will read it and think it's a little predictable then that's most likely because this type of plot has been copied a bit over the years. The cast of side characters is rather good in this one as well - although this is something I think Christie has always done well. She makes them all interesting and some of them very likeable and you're afraid to pick a favorite because they'll probably have done it in the end. Never you mind, it's one of her better books, and perfect for a lazy afternoon on the couch.
—Kirstine
5* "The A.B.C. Murders" by Agatha Christie is better because clues are up front, not trivia we could not possibly know, although some, as always, are saved for the dramatic final reveal. Christie's forte is creating atmosphere of 1935 England, with cozy chatty relationship details like ever-popular soap operas. An A.B.C. British railway schedule is left by each body, and a taunting note with the next location and day sent to Hercule Poirot. A mystery should be savored slowly, to give bubbles of
—An Odd1
Anytime someone talks to me about Agatha Christie lately, I find myself heaving a big sigh. By all accounts I should be all over this lady, I should be ripping through her mysteries like no one's bidness. But so far each of the books I've read feel interchangeable and if you were to ask me the plot of one over another I'd probably tactfully change the topic. Or say, "Look, a deer!" and run the other direction.I'm not discounting what Christie has done for detective fiction, or what she has done for women authors across the board (not just genre fiction). I get all that, I really do. Maybe I haven't had enough experience with her Marple stories to really rule Christie out entirely, but so far her Poirot books have left me feeling all too "meh" in the end. Reading her books, so far, have been just another way to pass the time - similar to watching a fly crawl on a newspaper while waiting for my Pop-tart to toast. I don't have to think much about it if I don't want to, which is fine and dandy, but then I get angry about the fact that I don't think that much about it. Am I just that jaded that I don't care about the fly on the newspaper, or in this case, who the serial killer is? Am I really that tired right now? It's possible, but I've read Christie when I was feeling totally awesome and I still walk away feeling like I missed something in my life.It's not to say that her books suck because they don't. As evidenced by the fact that I pick one up periodically, right? Seriously, maybe Poirot just really bugs me. I thought I would feel some kinship for him after having visited Belgium a couple times, but no. I feel only more distance from him. It doesn't really help that I know Christie herself wound up really not liking him much. Good job, Aggie. You wrote a character even you couldn't stand.
—El
