#ReadThis @AgathaChristie @HarperCollins @Morrow_PB #ThreeActTragedy by #AgathaChristie #Tenth #10 #HerculePoirot #Mystery
Murder never goes out of style: when it is by AGATHA CHRISTIE!
The tenth Hercule Poirot is indeed a perfect ten and it took us far too long to get to it since we left the Orient Express. Timeless Agatha is bringing beaucoup de excitement to your life with her Belgian best boy and if you say oh no my life is exciting now, you're LYING! We live in the most exciting place on earth, Manhattan, and we can assure you no one is living an exciting life anywhere right now. All the perfumes of Arabia are not sweetening our feelings towards the origins of this virus and lack of honesty at the source and murder of small businesses by certain government officials with overkill on shutdowns particularly in Manhattan. And so Christie chimes in with Lady Macbeth on p. 181! Keep calm and keep reading Agatha we say. It's just the thing.
Your fear of missing out should be associated with not reading all of Agatha Christie. We are on a roll here. The Agatha hit parade continues. Previously on Whom You Know, she has been featured in Poirot chronological order. We are using our grey cells and going in order:
The Mysterious Affair at Styles
Murder on the Links
Poirot Investigates
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
The Big Four
The Mystery of the Blue Train
Peril at End House
https://www.whomyouknow.com/2020/11/readthis.agathachristie.perilatendhouse.peachydeegan.harpercollins.williammorrow.html#.X7lGvGhKg2w
Lord Edgware Dies
Murder on the Orient Express
And here we are at ten, published in 1934. There's an egg, but no bacon, rye toast or coffee so furnish that yourself. You'll love Egg and all her impatience. For all Downton enthusiasts know there is a Lady Mary here! Julian Fellowes was born around 15 years after this book so maybe this is where he got the idea. All the world is a stage and none of it is a dress rehearsal!
You'll all be tickled pink to know that this one starts off with a cocktail party by the beach, and we all want to go to a virtual cocktail party! Sleight of hand, switcheroo! Details, details, details mes amies: read carefully. When cocktail parties start up again we sure are going to be more careful about what we drink and where it's coming from! We're not sure of the history of the game CLUE but surely you love playing it and the Christie novels are so reminiscent of the game, a huge positive.
Not only is Christie intellectually gifted but also she possesses emotional intelligence, capturing the human experience perfectly. "'My friend, beware of the day when your dreams come true. That child near us, doubtless she too has dreamt of coming abroad-of the excitement-of how different everything would be.'" (p. 57)
Of course Agatha Christie is English so she says things like electric torch for flashlight, and she appreciates the value of the multiple purposes for knitting needles (p. 103). It goes without saying she uses WHOM correctly. We have so much to say about whodunnit but we will not give it away: it does all make sense in the end and you won't see it coming. There are two halves of the same crime which is what makes this book unique.
Also, PBS is airing two specials on Agatha :
Three Act Tragedy is Highly Recommended by Whom You Know.
About the Author
Agatha Christie is the most widely published author of all time and in any language, outsold only in the Bible and Shakespeare. Her books have sold more than a billion copies in English and another billion in a hundred foreign languages. She is the author of eighty crime novels and short-story collections, around thirty plays, two memoirs, and six novels written under the name Mary Westmacott
She first tried her hand at detective fiction while working in a hospital dispensary during World War I, creating the now-legendary Hercule Prior with her debut novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles. In 1930, Miss Jane Marple made her first full-length novel appearance in The Murder at the Vicarage, quickly becoming another beloved and enduring character to rival Poirot's popularity. Additional series characters include the husband-and wife crime-fighting team of Tommy and Tuppence Beresford, private investigator Parker Pyne, and Scotland Yard detectives Superintendent Battle and Inspector Japp.
Many of Christie's novels and short stories were adapted into plays, films, and television series. The Mousetrap opened in 1952 and is the longest running play in history. Academy Award-nominated actor and director Kenneth Branagh helmed the acclaimed major motion picture Murder on the Orient Express in 2017 and its sequel, Death on the Nile, starring in both films as the Belgian detective. On the small screen Poirot has been most memorably portrayed by David Suchet, and Miss Marple by Joan Hickson and subsequently Geraldine McEwan and Julia McKenzie.
Christie was first married to Archibald Christie and then to archaeologist Sir Max Mallowan, whom she accompanied on expeditions to countries that would also serve as the settings for many of her novels. In 1971 she achieved one of Britain's highest honors when she was made a Dame of the British Empire. She died in 1976 at the age of eighty-five. The one-hundred-year anniversary of Agatha Christie stories and the debut of Hercule Poirot was celebrated around the world in 2020. Whom You Know will never stop celebrating it!
