Tommy & Tuppence Off Into the Sunset: Postern of Fate | 1973

Image from here

"I suppose without curiosity a man would be a tortoise. Very comfortable life, a tortoise has. Goes to sleep all winter and doesn't eat anything more than grass as far as I know, to live all the summer. Not an interesting life perhaps, but a very peaceful one." - Postern of Fate

The Sum of It

In this finale of the Tommy and Tuppence tales, our favorite bantering couple is in their sixties (aka elderly if you ask Agatha) and have acquired a new house in a cozy little seaside village in which to spend their sunset years. Along with the house, they bought a bunch of the old books in the shelves, as well as a shed full of random junk. As Tuppence is going through all the old books, she finds some strategic underlining that reveals a secret message: Mary Jordan did not die naturally. Clearly our curious friend Tuppence isn't just going to let such a message go, so she and Tommy start poking around their new little town to see if anyone has heard of Mary Jordan, or the little boy who left the cryptic message in his book, Alexander Parkinson. Turns out there are all kinds of rumors about a girl named Mary Jordan going back to WWI, some saying she was a German spy, some saying she was a British spy, all saying she died of accidental poisoning. Tommy and Tuppence have several very repetitive conversations with their neighbors, all of whom seem to have heard of the couple's apparently nationwide fame following their capture of a German spy in the last Tommy and Tuppence tale, N or M, and are very excited to talk about that over and over again. 

Tommy eventually starts going through some official channels to obtain information, including Mr. Pikeaway and Mr. Robinson, both of whom featured prominently in the non-Tommy and Tuppence story Passenger to Frankfurt. Meanwhile Tuppence is making the rounds to all the village's oldest inhabitants to see if they know anything useful about Mary Jordan, what she might have been spying about, and what perhaps might be hidden around the house, since so many people seem to think that something spy-related is on their property still. Despite a stated desire to keep their research on the down-low, Tuppence eventually enlists both their elderly gardener Isaac and a huge troop of neighborhood children in helping her track down information, which eventually results in old Isaac getting #MURDERED in Tuppence's own garden shed! There are some mysterious objects in there, including two garden stools in differing shades of blue known apparently as Oxford and Cambridge, as well as a giant wooden rocking horse thing, Mathilda, and a child's toy car, called Truelove for unknown reasons. Tommy and Tuppence narrow their search to these items, but while they're digging around to get close to a clue, someone takes a shot at poor Tuppence from a clump of grass! Their dog Hannibal chases the criminal off, and it takes a little intervention from Mr. Robinson and Mr. Pikeaway to finally clear up who the baddies in town still are. 

The YOA Treatment 

Alas, guys. As much as I love Tommy and Tuppence -- and YOU KNOW I truly do love them -- this book was pretty bad. All their old fun banter was replaced with deadly dull, amazingly repetitive conversations about not being able to remember things: names, places, nationalities, what a census is, quotes from books, etc., etc. That really took a lot of the wind out of my sails in terms of enjoying their detecting. The same was true of basically every conversation they had with anyone else, child or elderly neighbor, ALL of which consisted of someone trying to remember something that doesn't seem that hard to remember, "Err, she was German. Or maybe Russian. Or was it French?" "Oh yeah I remember who lived there, something like Parks. Or was it Parker? Or maybe Parkinson?" The whole time I'm like IT'S PARKINSON Why are we spending time on this conversation?? It was somewhat frustrating, but I had to remind myself that given that Agatha was getting on in years, this was probably a frustrating experience in her own life too!

Additionally, the mystery here -- who killed a British spy during WWI and what might she have hidden on their property before she was killed like 50 years ago -- was either not sufficiently compelling or not sufficiently established so as to really hold one's interest. I kept forgetting (maybe that was on purpose, in keeping with the book's theme) what Tommy and Tuppence were looking for. I think another thing that I have always loved about all the other Tommy and Tuppence stories has been the fairly rapid pace of the action. While some people prefer Agatha's more intellectual mysteries, like Poirot stories, I've always thought she writes a cracking good thriller, and those have been some of my favorite reads. However, I think in her later years, and this is one of the last three books she wrote, that just wasn't really her speed anymore. Over all, this last Tommy and Tuppence tale was definitely my least favorite of the books about them, and I found myself wishing she had allowed them to stay a little younger as she herself grew old, so that their mysteries would still feel fresh. 

We've only got two more books to report on before our Year of Agatha concludes! Stay tuned for Sleeping Murder and Curtain, the last Marple and Poirot books respectively, as well as a post letting you know about the direction we're planning on taking the blog in 2017.

- E. 

Don't Count Her Out: Nemesis | 1971

Image from here (this is a cool mystery blog to check out!)

"You, my dear, if I may call you that, have a natural flair for justice, and that has led to your having a natural flair for crime. I want you to investigate a certain crime. I have ordered a certain sum to be placed so that if you accept this request and as a result of your investigation this crime is properly elucidated, the money will become yours absolutely. I have set aside a year for you to engage on this mission. You are not young, but you are, if I may say so, tough." - Nemesis, p. 22

The Sum of It

Miss Marple, quite the rheumatic old lady, has taken to daily perusing the obituaries to see if she knows any of the deceased. One day, she notes that her old compatriot from A Caribbean Mystery, Mr. Rafiel, has passed away. She's awfully sad about that and thinks to herself that she wishes she could have seen him again before he died. Soon she hears from his attorneys saying they've got something for her from the deceased, and could she come to London? Upon visiting said attorneys she learns that Mr. Rafiel has left her a large sum of money on the condition that she solve a mystery for him. Only he leaves not a single clue as to what the mystery is. Miss Marple is not quite sure if she's going to be able to undertake this task. She tracks down his old secretary and can't learn anything from her, except that Mr. Rafiel did have a few kids, one of whom was a deadbeat son.

Pretty soon she gets notice that passage for her has been booked on a tour of the great homes and gardens of a certain part of England, by Mr. Rafiel, and every accommodation has been made for her. This must be part of the mystery! Off she sets on this bus tour, scrutinizing each of her fellow passengers to see who might be involved in the mystery. She recognizes one lady who had chatted with Miss Marple in St. Mary Mead not too long before, only she had different color hair... mysterious. She befriends a handsome, intelligent lady who used to run a girls school and eventually confesses to Miss Marple that she's not just on the tour to check out fancy homes and gardens, but that it is a "pilgrimage" of sorts to find out about a former pupil of hers who died, she says, because of love. Aha, thinks Miss Marple, now I'm onto something...only then this lady is killed by a boulder while walking on a path during the tour and Miss Marple can't get anything else out of her! 

Mr. Rafiel has also arranged for Miss Marple to stay with three sisters in their crumbling estate while she's in the village where her new friend has been killed, and Miss Marple distinctly senses that SOMETHING is up with these ladies, though she's not sure what exactly. She also discovers that at least one other person on her tour has been planted there by Mr. Rafiel to help keep an eye on her and help her parse out clues. She's getting closer and closer, and as she tours the little village, ever watchful, chatting up the post office lady and dropping into people's homes for tea, she gets closer and closer to the truth til everything comes to a head with a late night encounter with a dangerous person in Miss Marple's bedroom! 

The YOA Treatment

I don't know what it is about Miss Marple. Maybe because Agatha herself was a still clever but pretty old lady at this point, but this book is totally on point. I love how the mystery gradually unfolds from knowing only that there IS a mystery of some kind to one by one learning new pieces of the mystery, and THEN moving on to actually solving it. Miss Marple does a bit of Poirot-style "well I think I know something but I can't tell you til I figure out this other thing and make sure I'm right," which keeps you on the edge of your seat. 

Even though this one is set outside of St. Mary Mead, it is set in another small country village, and Miss Marple seems quite at home here. It also provides yet another example of not judging a book by its cover. Just because Miss M is a little old lady who gets tired out from a trip to the post office doesn't mean her mind isn't valuable and sharp as ever. Even Mr. Rafiel, who judged everyone around him pretty harshly, had the utmost respect for Miss Marple's mind, and counted on her to solve a mystery very dear to his heart as his last wish! 

While there is a bit of circling and circling around the main point of something, or slightly repetitive rehearsal of facts, this is still a solid and enjoyable read. I'm actually adding this one to my favorites list, which is well populated by Miss Marple books at this point! I think one thing I have consistently enjoyed about the Miss Marple stories, as well as other Agatha books with female leads, is that Agatha doesn't really write them like she thinks its unusual that a woman would be so clever and capable in the face of mystery and danger. While she certainly demonstrates that others around her might be mystified by this possibility, Agatha's language and style in writing these characters is not showy or like "haha-see-how-I-prove-a-big-point," and the characters themselves don't even make a big deal out of what they're doing, she just quite casually lets ladies save the day over and over again.

In my opinion, this little old lady detective still fit right in Agatha's wheelhouse, even near the very end of her writing career. 

- E. 

My Earliest Agatha Memory: Witness for the Prosecution, While The Light Lasts, & The Harlequin Tea Set | 1948, 1997, & 1997

(image from here)

(image from here)

(image from here)

"He [Poirot] felt the spell of Margharita Clayton. But he was not entirely sure about her...Such women could be, though innocent themselves, the cause of crimes." -The Mystery of the Spanish Chest, p. 151.

The Sum of It:
Our last short story recap of the year! I'm going to fixate on one particular story from the last three collections I've read, as it has a nostalgic connection for me (more on that later!) The Mystery of the Spanish Chest (which makes an appearance in The Harlequin Tea Set & Other Stories) details the rather gruesome death of a Mr. Edward Clayton. His super stabbed body was found in a rather elaborate, decorative Spanish chest in Major Charles Rich's home. Creepily, the body was discovered the morning after a party had been happening in that very room the entire evening before! Mr. Clayton's wife was in attendance at the party, and her husband was also supposed to be, but he was unable to at the last minute...but did attempt to visit Major Rich before the party. Poirot meets Mrs. Clayton and is, of course, instantly a bit entraceled by her beautiful face and is like oh yeah she def had the hots for Major Rich and vice versa (#affair???!!!), but she insists they didn't have anything going on. Poirot does his usual Poirot thing and interviews everyone who was at the party to see if there's something missing or if it really is as simple as Major Rich killed Mr. Clayton to marry Mrs. Clayton. Poirot must harken back to his remembrance of Shakespeare plots to figure it out!

The YOA Treatment:
I've written before about how my parents introduced me to Poirot from an early age. Masterpiece Mystery! was one of my earliest television memories, and, in particular, The Mystery of the Spanish Chest. Once upon an age ago my parents decided to tape that episode on VHS (along with The Kidnapped Prime Minister) and I would watch it over and over and over and OVER! To this day my father can't bear to watch it because I wore him out of that Spanish chest death with my repeated viewings! It's funny to think that television helped shape my ferocious appetite for reading, but it's rather true. Even though I can probably recount to you every detail of The Mystery of the Spanish Chest episode (that duel at the beginning! So dramatic...), I still loved reading the short story version and transporting myself back to my younger days when my Agatha journey was just beginning.

-A.

Get Off My Lawn: Passenger to Frankfurt | 1970

Image from here

"And the kind of people who will go anywhere, do anything, unfortunately believe anything, and so long as they are promised a certain amount of pulling down, wrecking, throwing spanners in the works, then they think the cause must be a good one and that the world will be a different place. They're not creative, that's the trouble -- only destructive. The creative young write poems, write books, probably compose music, paint pictures just as they always have done. They'll be all right -- But once people learn to love destruction for its own sake, evil leadership gets its chance." - Passenger to Frankfurt, p. 55

Good heavens, this one is a doozy. Shall do my best here. 

The Sum of It:

The book begins with Sir Stafford Nye, a rather unlauded member of the aristocracy and diplomatic service, having a beer at the airport on his way back to England from Malay. He's approached by a tall girl with an aquiline nose in the bar who quickly tells him she's in danger and asks to borrow his rather dramatic hooded cloak. And his passport. Deal is, she thinks she can pass as him and take his seat on a  plane to England, and if she doesn't, probably someone is going to kill her because her previous flight to Frankfurt has been cancelled. Sir Stafford is game enough to "wander off" and buy his niece a stuffed panda, allowing the stranger to drug his beer and steal his clothes and documents. When he wakes up a bit later following the sleeping drought she slipped him, his belongings appear to have been stolen, and he's missed his plane. 

Once he makes it back to England, he acts embarrassed, but all his diplomatic pals know something is up. He wonders about the girl, and whether she actually made it back to England, and decides to place a mysterious advertisement in the classifieds for "Passenger to Frankfurt." Soon a mysterious response is printed, and he finds himself passing the girl on a bridge, where she hands him some tickets to a Wagnerian opera. There, he finds himself sitting by her, but they don't talk, and she just makes some musical notes in his program. Eventually he deduces that they are the bars to "The Young Siegfried," a Wagner piece. He's still confused #heisnottheonlyone. Later, he attends a dinner at the U.S. Ambassador's residence and finds himself faced with the girl again, now presenting herself as a Countess. 

After dinner, she kidnaps him and takes him to meet with some mysterious powerful Brits at a country house where they basically tell him that they are freaked out by youths these days, who are essentially turning into neo-nazi/hippies and are gradually taking over the world. This mystery crew is a small group of important and concerned Brit leaders who are full of secrets and calling all the shots about world-saving. They want to enlist his services to figure out who's behind it all #MAKESSENSE (?!). 

So off he and the girl traipse to observe these mysterious and unruly youths at a series of music festivals (seriously) finally ending up at a castle in the Dolomites hosted by the richest, fattest woman Stafford has ever seen, who greets them in a formal gown, with solitary jewels on every finger and a colorful jeweled tiara, and hosts them at a mysterious, formal dinner also attended by uniformed young men who are basically a revived version of the Hitler youth (all blond, all putting their arms in the air and saying "Heil!"). This fat rich lady is apparently trying to take over the world via her youth army, led by the handsomest blonde guy Stafford has ever seen, who goes by Franz Josef and gets "heiled" all over the place, especially at the rallies he leads, Munich-beer-hall-style. 

Meanwhile, the British mystery league is like drawing diagrams about what's happening in the world and talking to other mystery leagues about them #againconfusing. Stafford's old aunt is also chatting with all her old man diplomatic friends and figuring out what's going on with the youths and the nazis and whatever else. She makes a trip to the mountains to confirm what it seems like we already knew, that the fat rich lady (an old family friend) is a fat rich nazi who wants to take over the world. Sort of. Aunt Matilda tells all her old man diplomatic friends about it, even though presumably they already knew, and are trying to figure out how to stop the total destruction of the world (Washington has been "razed," we're told). Eventually it turns out Aunt Matilda also knows a scientist who might have the key to solving the world's problems, and the British mystery league that Stafford signed up with go off to find him.

The YOA Treatment:

SHEESH. This book. Is intense. It was apparently published to honor Agatha's 80th birthday, and advertised as her 80th book. As an old lady, Agatha was clearly troubled by what was up with the youths of her elderly age, and felt like the world was going down the toilet. As Christie novels go, this one is practically dystopian, with armed crowds of young people singing Wagner, heil-ing everyone, and taking over world capitols. There are some pages that are fascinating, and really make you think of the somewhat bizarre alt-right trends of some folks around the world (such as the quote at the top). The description Agatha offers of the fat, rich lady (Big Charlotte) is so vivid and detailed that it makes you wonder if she saw someone like this at some point in her life, sitting on a throne in a German castle, surrounded by the world's most valuable art, covered in jewels, welcoming guests in velvet gowns and diamond-and-sapphire shirt studs to a dinner attended by a legion of uniformed young men with swords. 

This is the type of stuff Agatha has always been good at, images of glamour, painting a picture for her readers, intelligent folks acting as spies in odd but interesting situations. However, when she starts trying to interpret and discourse on global politics and youth culture things get... a little weird. A WIDE range of random characters meant to be politicians from a range of countries spend PAGES discoursing on the different types of weapons they have at their disposal to potentially stop the armies of youth around the world. The main characters disappear for periods of time with no explanation. At one point there's a wedding. We're meant to understand a couple inside jokes that figure into the plot, but are never clearly explained. A few quotes floating about on the world wide web from reviewers of this book sum it up pretty well: 

"...The rest of the book is largely a discourse on a favourite old theme of Mrs. Christie's, the present state of the world and its future outlook, on both of which she takes a somewhat dim view. In other words, for her eightieth book a rather more serious work than usual from this author." - Anthony Berkeley Cox, The Guardian, 1970

"Her eightieth book and though not her best very far from her worst...At moments one wonders whether the old dear knows the difference between a hippie and a skinhead but she is still marvelously entertaining." - Maurice Richardson, The Observer, 1970

This is the harshest, but perhaps most accurate, no offense to dearest Agatha: 

"The last of the thrillers, and one that slides from the unlikely to the inconceivable and finally lands up in incomprehensible muddle. Prizes should be offered to readers who can explain the ending. Concerns the youth uproar of the 'sixties, drugs, a new Aryan superman and so on, subjects of which Christie's grasp was, to say the least, uncertain (she seems to have the oddest idea of what the term 'Third World' means, for example)." - Robert Barnard, from his book A Talent to Decieve - An Appreciation of Agatha Christie [She uses the term Third World to refer to some kind of new political society envisioned by these neo-nazi hippie youths taking over the world, bless her]

I must say, this was not my favorite, though I did really enjoy the normal spy bits, and found some of the concerns about the world a bit prescient of our Agatha, considering the troubling political circumstances we find ourselves in today (she literally mentions trouble in Syria). The solution she finds to the world's problems seems a BIT unlikely, but perhaps she was prescient about that too. 

- E. 

SO Tell Me What You Want, What You Really, Really Want: Endless Night | 1967

(Image from here)

'"Nobody shall drive us away," I said. "We're going to be happy here." We said it like a challenge to fate.' - Endless Night, Ch. 13

The Sum of It: 

Our narrator, Mike Rogers, really wants the reader to know him. He tells us all about himself, his success with the ladies, his nomadic lifestyle, all the different jobs he had, the sense he's got of being on the verge of something interesting: then he sees a real estate listing. A house called The Towers is up for auction, and out of curiosity he walks up the wooded road to see it. Immediately he knows he just has to live there. The views and the trees and the rolling hills are perfect, and his old friend, an architect, has already designed a house for him to build someday. Alas, Mike is broke, so he's not sure how his dreams will ever come true. While he's wandering through the trees, he stumbles across a beautiful American girl, who also climbed the hill to Gypsy's Acre (that's what the land is known as locally) curious about the real estate listing. 

Mike and the girl, who turns out to be a crazy wealth heiress named Ellie, fall promptly in love. She is about to come of age, and is eager to escape her little bubble of other wealthy people and elderly advisors watching her every move. She and Mike elope, surprising everyone, and she surprises Mike by purchasing Gypsy's Acre, and they sign up his ailing architect friend, Rudy Santonix, to design it before he drops dead of consumption. Once the house is built, Mike and Ellie move in and are so excited and happy, except they keep getting harassed and warned off by this old creepy Gypsy lady, who is rumored to be mad that her people got kicked off the land ages ago. Eventually Ellie invites her former secretary, Greta, to come stay. Ellie and Greta are BFF, and Mike is more than a little jealous, eventually even getting into a shouting match with the glamorous Greta. Soon enough, a fatal accident befalls one of the party, and everything is thrown into tumult. That accident is closely followed by the disappearance of the old Gypsy lady, Miss Lee, and the death of a friend from the neighborhood, Claudia Hardcastle. People start to think something fishy is going on and THAT'S when it really gets good.  

The YOA Treatment: 

OOOOOH I have been waiting ALL YEAR to see if this book was as good as the absolutely PERFECT version from television. And guess what...IT WAS. Boy is it creepy and clever, Broadchurch-style. I seriously recommend this one if you're in the market for a good mystery to read while it's cold and gray outside this winter.

For one thing, I've found as we've moved through this year that I really enjoy the books where we get our narration in first person. There's an added element of mystery in wondering if we can trust our narrator, or if they're missing something, or if we're missing something about them. The narrator of Endless Night, Mike Rogers, eagerly pours himself out into the pages of the book. He's telling the story but he's regularly trying to get the reader to understand something about himself, how he became who he is, the experiences and circumstances that shaped him, his own hopes and dreams. Agatha does an amazing job of getting inside his head and making us feel like we know him. At one point he tells us: 

"I suppose what I really am is restless. I want to go everywhere, see everything, do everything. I want to find something. Yes, that's it, I want to find something."

There is also a nice creepy sense of foreboding in this book, you can't quite figure out what's going to go wrong, but you know something will. As Mike falls in love with a piece of land, Gypsy's Acre, and with the girl he meets under the trees there, things seem to be going great, but then creepy stuff happens: a weird prediction from an elderly Gypsy lady on the road, a brick through a window, a warning look in someone's eyes. Once a terrible thing finally happens, we still aren't quite sure what's happening, even who might be the culprit. By the time you reach the end of this book, the revelation of the actual criminal (if it's a new story to the reader) is pretty impressively shocking, right up there with Crooked House. Though this is one of Agatha's last few books (boohoo!), it feels like a super strong return to form to me. 

-E.

Something's Rotten in the State of Meadowbank: Cat Among the Pigeons | 1959

(image from here)

"But you must remember this," said Miss Bulstrode, "one or other of the girls may wish to make herself important by exaggerating some incident or even by inventing one. Girls do very odd things..." -Cat Among the Pigeons, p. 94

The Sum of It:
As we get closer and closer to the end of our Agatha journey this year, I am becoming more and more sad about saying goodbye to Poirot! Although Emily and I discovered this year that we prefer a Miss Marple book (#sorryHercule), it was still sad to realize this was my second to last Poirot read! Okay so on to the summarizing:

Our story begins in Ramat (a fictional Middle Eastern country) where the Prince of the land (one Prince Ali Yusef, Hereditary Sheik of Ramat) is consulting his British private pilot and pal, Bob Rawlinson. There's a revolution going on, and Prince Ali has decided he needs to flee the country or be killed. Bob agrees to fly him out, but before they go, Prince Ali entrusts Bob with a huge task: thinking of a way to smuggle nearly a million pounds's worth of jewels out of the country! Bob is like GEEZ, LOUISE HOW DO I DO THAT? The palace is full of spies, and the two men's plane ride will be dangerous enough. Luckily, Bob's sister and niece have been visiting him, and they should be able to leave the country un-searched. Bob goes to their hotel to make the jewel arrangements and potentially bid farewell (forever!?) to his family, but they are not there. He spends some time in their room doing something mysterious to hide the jewels, and then takes off with Prince Ali on their flight to freedom.

Some months later, Bob's niece, Jennifer, is one of many girls arriving at fancy-dancy school, Meadowbank, for the start of term. The school is run by "headmistress extraordinaire" Miss Bulstrode, who prides herself on running an establishment that takes on the brightest students, with a couple of princesses sprinkled in for the wow factor. One of these princesses is Princess Shaista of Ramat. Princess Shaista is fond of touting the fact that a) she is royal, b) she was engaged to her cousin, the now deceased Prince Ali (Bob and Ali's plane crashed in the mountains as they attempted to flee #RIP #sadface), and c) as an important royal, she is likely to be kidnapped at any moment. Miss Bulstrode and Co. assume she is just a dramatic teenage girl and ignore her fears.

Meadowbank is experiencing an influx of new staff, notably a new games mistress, Miss Springer, a new French mistress, Mlle. Blanche, and a young gardener named Adam, who is repeatedly described as obnoxious to the Meadowbank staff, as they assume all the young girls will be in love with him (#accurate). We learn early on that Gardener Adam is actually not a gardener (well, sort of, apparently his mom was good with plants?), but in fact a secret agent sent to keep an eye on Princess Shaista. The school year seems to be going along swimmingly, until games mistress Miss Springer is found #MURDERED in the new sports pavilion! Although a rather brusque and disliked woman, there doesn't seem to be much motive for her death. Local Inspector Kelsey is doing his best on the case, and then has to work double time when there is a SECOND murder, and a kidnapping to boot! The case needs a professional, and so, nearly 3/4 through the book, one of Meadowbank's plucky students gets herself to London to bring in none other than Hercule Poirot to make sense of it all. As he makes his way through his usual interviews, it becomes apparent that something (or more importantly, someONE!) is not right this year at Meadowbank...there is a cat among the pigeons!

The YOA Treatment:
When I first started reading this book, it felt a bit like Agatha was in two places at once. The opening scenes set in Ramat (and the following intrigue) felt very much like They Came to Baghdad or Destination Unknown. And then the rest of the story set at Meadowbank felt like her usual English countryside murder mystery. However, she did a fairly good job of bringing the two together and leaves you with a story that is one part caper, one part whodunit. I was a bit disappointed that Poirot didn't come into the picture earlier (and when he did, he figured things out awwwwfully quickly), but the cast of colorful Meadowbank characters kept my attention until it was finally time for Hercule's appearance.

I also admire Agatha's take on a bit of a coming of age story by setting this mystery at a girl's school. Quite a bit of the story is seen through the eyes of several of Meadowbank's students and it's entertaining to see how their adolescent trials and tribulations fit into the plot. Secret cigarettes are discovered, tennis rackets are unraveling, tiffs are had with Mother, and the halls are thick with gossip about the teachers. I'm attempting to work my way through Emma Cline's truly excellent book, The Girls, and while Cat Among the Pigeons is vastly different, I get some of those same pangs of recognition of my younger self like "Oh wow, that IS what it was like to be 15 and have a crush on the hot guy that mows the lawn at your school."

Overall, a read that's fun and intriguing and with a bit of Poirot to boot!

-A.

Bonus Read & Guest Post: The Monogam Murders | 2014

(image from here)

"Ah! Now you think like a proper detective. Hercule Poirot is educating you on how to use the little gray cells." 

-Hercule Poirot, The Monogram Murders, p. 233

We are so pleased to have company this week as we recap a bonus read, The Monogram Murders. Sophia from the utter delightful book blog, Main Street & Maple, joined us as we dug into this 2014 NEW case starring our favorite Belgian sleuth, Hercule Poirot! For those of you not familiar with Monogram Murders (and the subsequent Closed Casket), it is penned by mystery author Sophie Hannah, who received permission from the Agatha Christie Estate to revive dear Hercule. The result is fairly wonderful, but let's give you a little background first....

The Sum of It:
It's 1929 and Poirot has decided to take staycation to a new level and rent a room at a boarding house literally across the street from his usual abode, #whitehavenmansions. Whilst at Mrs. Unsworth's lodging house, Poirot befriends Scotland Yarddie, Edward Catchpool, and the two enjoy spending time talking crime and working out crossword puzzles by the fire. Poirot has also developed a penchant for Pleasant's Coffee House, a small cafe that apparently has the best coffee in the world, and decent food to boot. On his weekly table for one dinner dates, Poirot encounters a harried and terrified woman (later found out to be named Jennie) in the cafe. Poirot approaches Jennie and asks her if anything is wrong. She ominously tells Poirot there's nothing to be done to help her cause she's basically a DEAD WOMAN WALKING. "Who's after you!?!" Poirot asks. "Lemme help you out!" But Jennie refuses, instead begging him to, when she is eventually found #murdered, to not look for her killer because she deserves to die! #OMINOUS. Poirot is rightly concerned about the situation, particularly when, later that night, Catchpool tells him of not one, but THREE murders that have taken place at a fancy London hotel! All three victims are laid out as if awaiting burial...and each has a monogrammed cufflink in their mouth #creepytown. Is Mademoiselle Jennie among the dead?! You'll just have to pick up and copy to find out AND to see if Poirot and Catchpool hurry to catch the killer before he (or she!) strikes again!

The YOA Treatment:
Since we are nearly finished (EEK!) with our Year of Agatha project, and have only a handful of Poirot stories left, we felt this was a good time to see how we felt about Sophie Hannah's Poirot. We enlisted Sophia's help in reviewing Monogram Murders to also get some perspective from someone new to Agatha Christie's works. Here's her verdict:

This might be a cardinal sin as a guest blogger on Year of Agatha, but I have never read a Hercule Poirot story! Shh, don’t tell them! Having no experience with Hercule Poirot previously, I felt I was getting to know the famous detective along with Detective Catchpool, his partner on the case. Unlike the girls of Year of Agatha, who undoubtedly know Poirot well, to me, he started off as just another detective in a mystery novel. Regardless, without knowing whether Hannah stayed true to his character, I was instantly charmed with Poirot’s quirks and peculiarities. I messaged Audrey & Emily as soon as I was done asking, "Does he always talk in the third person?!"  

In true Christie fashion, the plot weaved throughout The Monogram Murders is captivating and intricate. When I read mystery novels, I am always trying to guess who did it and how it was done (aren’t we all??), but I COULD NOT figure it out in this novel. And while the plot is incredibly complex, I never found myself lost or lagging behind. Poirot has a brilliant manner of keeping the reader up to speed without spoon feeding the answers. 

Adding to the fun of uncovering the mystery in this novel, is the vibrant cast of characters. From Poirot himself to the animated hotel-owner to the esteemed artist, there was really never a dull moment at the Bloxham Hotel (which is almost a character in itself). 

Now that I’ve read Sophie Hannah’s take on Hercule Poirot, I think it’s about time I pick up a Poirot novel done by the queen herself!

Overall, we Year of Agatha girls thoroughly enjoyed The Monogram Murders. Full disclosure, the first chapter was a little off-putting for us - we still aren't totally sold on the idea that Poirot would trust his evening hot drink to a cafe, or that he would be drinking that much coffee since super rich hot chocolate is his usual jam. However, we can buy that if he did go through a coffee shop phase, it would be in his earlier days before he gets too old and fussy! But after the first "scene" at Pleasant's, we were totally hooked. The initial round of hotel murders is presented a bit more macabre than the usual Agatha (seemed a bit more Sherlock than Poirot), but the premise is as much a recipe for a late night page turner as any Christie! While the overall pacing of the book was quite excellent, we were a bit bogged down by the ending. Poirot is famous for his EPIC and often lengthy denouements, but this one felt particularly long for some reason. Sophia's assessment is accurate that, while it was complex, it was thoroughly explained. However, it felt as though Poirot's assembled group of suspects/witnesses/etc. would have had to sit for hours to hear his full explanation!

Now, on to what we loved. Poirot did truly feel like Poirot in Monogram Murders. Hannah has done a wonderful job of capturing the Hastings/Poirot relationship in Poirot's interactions with Catchpool, with the latter playing the pivotal Hastings role of saying a small, innocuous phrase that sets off Poirot's little gray cells into a spiral of understanding. Poirot was full of his usual bizarre requests, sending people on random errands that end up producing vital pieces of evidence, and interviewing witnesses like a pro. We heartily recommend this as a read for any Agatha Christie fan, and think the Queen of Crime herself would be pleased with this fresh Poirot success!

A huge thanks to Sophia for reading along with us! If you're in the market for a non-Agatha mystery to read, be sure to check out her reviews of recent thrillers for some great recommendations!

-A & E.

SaveSave

Ahhhhh, Witchy Woman: By the Pricking of My Thumbs | 1968

Image found on Pinterest, a perfectly creepy cover!

"I daresay people have liked murderers," said Tuppence very reasonably. "It's like swindlers and confidence tricksmen who always look so honest and seem so honest. I daresay murderers all seem very nice and particularly softhearted. That sort of thing."
-By the Pricking of My Thumbs p. 210

The Sum of It: 

TOMMY AND TUPPENCE ARE BACK!!!!!!! Yesssssssssssssssssss. Ok summarizing. 

Tommy and Tuppence (though referred to throughout as elderly #projecting) seem like they are maybe in their 50's at this point. Though they may be older, with grown-up children and grandchildren out in the world, their minds are still just as sharp and the banter is still #TOPNOTCH (phew!) As they're having breakfast one day, Tommy starts thinking he should probably go visit his old Aunt Ada at the little old ladies home where she's been living for the past couple years. Though Aunt Ada genuinely despises Tuppence, she decides to go along with Tommy anyway for solidarity and also because if being mean to her brings Aunt Ada some joy, then Tuppence doesn't grudge her that :). Upon arrival Aunt Ada immediately denies she knows Tuppence and kicks her out of the room, so Tuppence goes down to sit in the little sunroom, where she joins a "fluffy" old lady with a pretty face and white hair, who's drinking milk. The old lady chats a bit and then asks Tuppence, "Was it your poor child?" Tuppence is like huh what and the lady starts talking about a poor child buried behind the fireplace. Mercifully Tommy comes in to rescue her from this real awkward situation and back home they go. 

Only once they get there, Tuppence can't stop thinking about that old lady, Mrs. Lancaster, and her weird line of conversation. A few weeks later, Tommy's Aunt Ada dies, and when they go back to the old ladies home to sort her things, Tuppence intends to talk to Mrs. Lancaster again, because she's worried Mrs. L knows something about some child who was killed or some crime and might be in danger. HOWEVER when they get there they learn Mrs. L was recently disappeared from the home by some relative named Mrs. Johnson, who gave a false address. They also learn that Mrs. L gave Aunt Ada a painting of a pretty house by a canal and a little bridge, and Tuppence immediately realizes she saw the house once on a train journey, and decides that it's the only clue to find out where poor Mrs. L might be so Tuppence can make sure she's safe. When Tommy goes off on a business trip, Tuppence decides to figure out where the little house is, and hopefully Mrs. L, and heads off on a little trip of her own. Only, once she actually stumbles upon the pretty house and the little village nearby, Tuppence quickly realizes she's become mixed up in a mystery much bigger than the one she came to solve. The only question is whether anyone can save her from the danger she's stumbled upon!?

The YOA Treatment: 

I knew I was a big fan of Tommy and Tuppence in their early days, but given how dated the last couple novels of Agatha's felt, I was a little worried about how their charming repartee and page-turning plots might fare as their characters got older. But the GREAT news is that in my opinion, it felt like nothing had changed. Tuppence is still the same plucky adventurer she was when we first met her in London just after WWI. Tommy is still gruffly admiring of his wife's cunning, and clever and resourceful on his own. It was super delightful to see them again, and follow along with their action-packed adventures #CAPER!

We've also been waiting for this one since reading The Pale Horse, where Agatha first stumbled on the little plot device of a random old lady asking "Was it your poor child?" and going on about a baby buried behind a fireplace. In that book, it was just a throwaway anecdote, but clearly Agatha found it creepily inspiring and mulled over it for a few years before developing it into a full-blown plot, which served this tale quite well. 

Unlike some of the less action driven stories of late, the pace of this one moved along easily, and the twists along the way didn't feel manufactured, but instead felt clever and fun. Each of the newly introduced side characters felt fully fleshed out and familiar, filling their roles in a little country village, as opposed to the stilted design and flat nature of many of the "modern," city-based young people in some of the other recent novels #villagelife. It felt like a true return to form, and I really can't imagine why Agatha didn't write more Tommy & Tuppence books, because she is so very good at them! 

- E. 

Agatha is NOT a Fan of Hipsters: Third Girl | 1966

Image from here

"It's the way girls like living now. Better than P.G.s or a hostel. The main girl takes a furnished flat, and then shares out the rent. Second girl is usually a friend. Then they find a third girl by advertising, if they don't know one." - Third Girl, p. 16

The Sum of It: 

Elderly Poirot is relaxing at home of an evening when his butler, George, comes in to let him know that there's a young lady at the door who thinks she might have killed somebody. Normally, Poirot doesn't take walk-ins at midnight, but he is intrigued so George ushers her in. Once she gets there, though, Poirot internally judges her mini-skirt and long, stringy hair and tries to get her to tell him more about this maybe-murder, but then she's like "Sorry, you're too old" (literally) and leaves. 

Given that one of Poirot's chief characteristics is vanity, he sulks about this for a good while, and eventually confesses about it to his bff Ariadne Oliver over hot chocolate, and they decide they should find out who this girl is, because she definitely seemed messed up about something, and after a description, Ariadne realizes she just met this same girl a country house, and moreover that she's the "third girl" in an apartment leased by someone else she is familiar with. 

She and Poirot spend time tracking her down, as well as her "decorative" painter boyfriend who has long hair and skinny velvet pants #HIPSTERS, constantly judging every young person they come across for their dirty appearance. All along, Poirot keeps being like "what we need is a #MURDER" because what he can't figure out is who this girl thinks she killed, exactly. Even once they find her, she seems pretty confused about it, other than a recent maybe-poisoning that happened to her stepmother. Ariadne practices her tracking skills (and gets coshed on the head in the process), Poirot mulls over the same set of facts three or four separate times without result, and they all discover the power of a good hair-do before the mystery is solved. 

The YOA Treatment: 

In this book, Agatha laments the unseemly fashion and grooming habits of the Beat Generation - at one point even referencing the Beatles - while also lamenting how out of time and fashion her own generation (rep. by Poirot, presumably) were becoming. It must have been pretty baffling for someone who grew up in the Victorian era to see kids running around with long, unstyled hair and mini-skirts. Even while she's judging it, she tries to use the lingo of the times, particularly in regards to recreational drugs of the day, allowing several characters to run through long lists of silly-sounding drug names, which feels kind of like hearing your grandmother say "jiggy" #awkward. Also, by the pacing and repetition of much of the narrative, particularly as pertains to Poirot's ongoing internal monologue as we works through the details of the crime, we start to see a bit of the weakness of some of Agatha's later works. 

Though this book isn't bad, it's a bit circular, and takes kind of too long to reach the conclusion, which in the end seems somewhat unrealistic (more so than usual), thought some critics have said that some of the more heavy-handed elements of this novel are purposeful, kind of meta-fiction. Additionally, this book made me really miss Hastings. While Ariadne Oliver has since often been inserted as a bit of a comic foil to Poirot's methodical nature, it's just not the same as the credulous and constantly misguided Hastings. I don't really know why Agatha took him away, other than the fact that we know she got quite over Poirot long before she stopped writing him, and maybe she thought getting rid of Hastings would help put a stop to him. Either way, while Poirot is of course a great creation, I think his character is most fully rounded with Hastings by his side, and his old pal is truly missed in this book. 

- E. 

Miss Marple Hits the Beach: A Caribbean Mystery | 1964

Image from here

"Do you think a murderer ought to be a happy man?"

Miss Marple coughed. "Well, they usually have been, in my experience." 

"I don't suppose your experience has gone very far," said Mr. Rafiel. 

In this assumption, as Miss Marple could have told him, he was wrong. But she forbore to contest his statement. Gentlemen, she knew, did not like to be put right in their facts." 

- A Caribbean Mystery, p. 113

The Sum of It: 

Nephew Raymond really is so very generous to his Aunt Jane. In this book, one of Agatha's last few featuring Miss Marple, our little old lady of mystery is quite out of her element at a tropical Caribbean resort, where Nephew Raymond has dispatched her for her health. Back home, everybody from the ladies down the street to Scotland Yard know of her prowess as a detective, but here, she's just a "fluffy old lady" who knits and prattles on about the weather. 

That is, until another elderly visitor to the resort drops dead, presumably of heart failure, until Miss Marple and the resort's doctor figure out that he didn't actually have any heart problems, and the young lady who cleans his room points out that the heart pills on his bathroom sink that substantiated the "heart failure" diagnosis were never there before, and actually belonged to another guest. The day of his death, the old fella had been talking loudly to Miss Marple about a murderer he had a snapshot of, but just when he pulled it out of his wallet he saw someone behind Miss Marple and shoved it back in and changed the subject #MYSTERY. The old man's death, and subsequent murder investigation, put everyone on edge, especially the hotel's proprietress, Molly Kendal. 

When Molly, who's been having nightmares, finds another person connected to the case with a knife in her back, things go from bad to worse. At this point, despite people constantly dismissing her, only Miss Marple can figure out what's going on, and she enlists the island's other most senior resident, Mr. Rafiel, to add some credibility to her deductions. They do the math, and come down to the surprising fact of the real killer not a moment too soon!

The YOA Treatment: 

Part of the delight of a Miss Marple book is observing her in her element, the small town, country life, where her constant memory of the oddities of neighbors makes her crime solving ability unparalleled. So, this book, set in a random tropical setting, feels a bit out of the wheelhouse, like one of those newer Nancy Drew books written by Carolyn Keene's ghostwriter where Nancy and her pals zoom around a lake on jetskis. That said, this one was stronger than I was afraid it was going to be, in terms of the mystery! I thought I remembered the killer from seeing the television version of A Caribbean Mystery (which is actually pretty good!), but the book still held my interest and kept me turning the pages til my hunches were confirmed! 

There were a lot more aspects of this book that felt like callbacks to Miss Marple's Victorian upbringing than I remember in others, from her lamenting a woman on the island who doesn't present herself as well as she "ought to", and how she really ought to marry again, to some unfortunate lingo and characterization of the people of color who live on the island #CRINGEWORTHY. Both Agatha and Miss Marple were getting on up there in age by the time A Caribbean Mystery was published, so perhaps that explains some of it. 

While this isn't my favorite Miss Marple, I was pleased to see Agatha could still spin quite a yarn as we move into the later years of her career. 

Bon voyage!

- E. 

Beginnings & Ends: Poirot's Early Cases, Miss Marple's Final Cases, & Problem at Pollensa Bay | 1974, 1979, & 1991

(image from here)

(image from here)

(image from here)

"Remember it, and if you think at any time that I am growing conceited - it is not likely, but it might arise."

I concealed a smile.

"Eh bien, my friend, you shall say to me, 'Chocolate box.' Is it agreed?"

"It's a bargain!" -Poirot & Hastings, "The Chocolate Box," Poirot's Early Cases, p. 139

The Sum of It:

We are getting deep into the land of We Have Read All These Short Stories Before In Other Collections...but never fear! The good thing about revisiting short story collections is coming across one you really enjoy. This time, that story for me was "The Chocolate Box." 

The story begins with Poirot and Hastings having a cozy night in, sipping warm drinks (Poirot has what sounds like a truly tasty cup of hot chocolate, and yet Hastings observes he would basically rather poke his own eye out than drink the stuff #sillyhastings) and reminiscing on Poirot's old cases. Poirot says uh, you know there was this one time when I actually got the case WRONG. And Hastings is like GASP, tell me everything. 

Back when Poirot was in the Belgian detective force, there was a big old row going on in France between the Catholic church and the state. One true anti-Catholic baddie guy named Paul Deroulard was a French politician with a Belgian wife who died from falling down a flight of stairs (#yikes #handrailsplz.) After her death, Paul inherited all her money and her house in Brussels. While living there, old Paul ALSO dies rather suddenly. Poirot recalls that he was about to go on vacay, and, being a "bon catholique," was not too devastated by this guy's death. However, he received a visit from a beautiful young woman named Virginie, a cousin of the late Mrs. Deroulard, who requested Poirot's assistance in solving the death of Paul. For all Poirot makes fun of Hastings being star-struck by the beautiful ladies, Poirot himself really can't say no when they ask him for help.

Poirot's investigations lead him to the Deroulard home, where he poses as a journalist to get some answers from the household, which includes several servants, Paul's elderly mother, an English friend named Wilson, and a French neighbor named Saint Alard. Paul Deroulard died suddenly as he had retired to smoke and drink with his guests after dinner. Dinner seemed to have been partaken by all and untampered, same with the after-dinner refreshments. However, the case takes a turn when Poirot discovers that Paul Deroulard alone was a major chocoholic, and always had some after dinner. A quick pose as a plumber, and a rifle through some medicine cabinets make the whole case clear to Poirot. However, as he returns to the Deroulard home to announce the murderer, he finds that he was completely wrong! Poirot has oddly fond memories of the case, as he imagines it keeps him humble. But we all know that Hercule Poirot will never be as humble as he imagines, and that is precisely why we love him.

Miss Marple's Final Cases is made up of several short stories, nearly all of which we have already discussed here on the blog. However, I do heartily recommend giving it a read, especially if you want to read more about Miss Marple in her St. Mary Mead everyday life!

And speaking of St. Mary Mead, it was intriguing to read what smacks of a first run at The Murder at the Vicarage in "The Love Detectives" from Problem at Pollensa Bay & Other Stories. Mr. Satterthwaite & Mr. Quin team up with Colonel Melrose to discover who has coshed cranky old Sir James Dwighton over the head in his library. Of course the initial likely suspect is his beautiful young wife and the Dwighton's houseguest turned Mrs. D.'s boyfriend turned ex-houseguest, Paul. However, additional injured parties come out of the woodwork as the investigation continues, and it seems like there is no end of motives for the murder of Sir James. Do Satterthwaite and Quin work it out in the end? You'll just have to pick up a copy to find out!

The YOA Treatment:

We have several exciting things coming up over the next few weeks as #PHASEONE of The Year of Agatha comes to a close! We are very much looking forward to a guest blog post by the delightful Sophia from Main Street & Maple book blog, as well as a little Cyber Monday deal in our Etsy shop #AgathashirtsforChristmas #Poirotpresents! Be sure to stay tuned in the next few weeks for more details.

Have a wonderful weekend!

-A.

SaveSave
SaveSave

Memory Lane: Elephants Can Remember | 1972

(image from here)

"So I thought that what we've really got to do is to get at the people who are like elephants. Because elephants, so they say, don't forget." -Mrs. Ariadne Oliver, Elephants Can Remember, p. 31

The Sum of It:
Elephants Can Remember reunites two of our favorite sleuth besties: Poirot and Mrs. Ariadne Oliver. Mrs. Oliver is paying her famous author dues and attending a literary luncheon with the masses. She has some initial fun chatting with other writers and eating salad and whatnot, but then it gets to the point in the event where everyone gets coffee and is expected to mingle and she is pounced upon by a rather detestable fan. A Mrs. Burton-Cox gushes about her adoration of Mrs. Oliver's books, and then moves on to something unexpected. Mrs. Burton-Cox nonchalantly asks, Oh hey, you have a goddaughter named Celia, right? Mrs. Oliver is taken aback by the question and then has kind of a legit hard time remembering if she actually DOES have a goddaughter named Celia. In the end she decides, yes she does, although she hasn't seen Celia in a long time. Mrs. Burton-Cox goes on to say Hey Celia is supposed to marry my son, but there's a bit of #MYSTERY surrounding the death of her parents, specifically WHICH ONE KILLED THE OTHER. It would appear that Mrs. Oliver has somehow completely forgotten (or maybe suppressed the memory of) the rather gruesome murder/suicide of her old friend (and Celia's mother), Molly Ravenscroft and her husband, General Alistair Ravenscroft. The pair was found near their home many years prior, shot dead, with only their fingerprints on the gun at the scene. It was assumed that either some terrible accident had occurred (#unlikely), or that one had killed the other and then themselves...but which had done the deed?

Mrs. Oliver is kind of frustrated Mrs. Burton-Cox is bringing up these painful memories and can't really understand why it matters to the marriage of Celia and Mrs. B-C's son, Desmond (neither can I, to be honest.) Mrs. Burton-Cox is insisting that she needs to know what happened to give her blessing to Celia and Desmond's union. Mrs. Oliver finally escapes the horrid lady, determined to not think on the matter any further because it's none of her business. But Mrs. Burton-Cox has laid some nagging seeds of curiosity, and before she knows it, Mrs. Oliver is heading over to see Poirot to get his advice on the matter. Elephants, they decide, are the way to go about solving the matter. Elephants, meaning people who were close to the Ravenscrofts back in the weeks leading up to their deaths. These "elephants" will transport them back in time and tell them everything they need to know to solve Ravenscroft tragedy.

The YOA Treatment: 
When Agatha Christie wrote Elephants Can Remember, she was in her early 80s and nearing the end of her career. This is actually the last novel she wrote featuring Poirot and Mrs. Oliver (Curtain was actually written much earlier, though published in 1975.) She received some criticism for this novel (not unlike many from these later years), and I will say some of the reviews are justified. While the premise is intriguing, the solving of a murder committed much earlier is not unlike many of her other novels, many of which are referenced in the book (Five Little Pigs, Mrs. McGinty's Dead, Sad Cypress, or Hallowe'en Party) and are better reads. The language is not as snappy, and at times a bit muddled. Elephants Can Remember was included in a 2009 study comparing Agatha's early and later works, and it is thought that, due to the at times confusing and repeated language in this book, she may have been suffering from Alzheimer's disease.

I get a little pang of sadness when I think of aging Agatha, remembering along with Poirot in this book of their former glory days. However, despite its flaws, Elephants Can Remember is still a mystery, and a rather good one at that. I was surprised at the ending, and I think you will be too. You can tell Agatha was still doing what she loved, and was determined to keep writing for as long as she could #resilience #queen.

- A.

Star Struck: The Mirror Crack'd | 1962

(image from here)

"I don't think," he said gently, "that anything that you or I could say about murders is likely unduly to excite or shock Miss Marple. I can assure you, my dear Miss Knight, that Miss Marple can contemplate murder and sudden death and indeed crime of all kinds with the utmost equanimity." - The Mirror Crack'd, p. 203

The Sum of It:

Times, they are a'changin' (ain't that the truth, AGH) in St. Mary Mead, and Miss Marple is trying to come to terms with it. There's a new "development" with lots of brand new houses built all close together, a new supermarket (where they expect you to shop for your own groceries #ew), and even Miss Marple's friend Mrs. Dolly Bantry has sold her old estate, Gossington Hall, and is living in the lodge at the gates. Gossington has been purchased by an American film star, Marina Gregg, on the waning end of her fame, and her husband, which has the town all a-twitter with celebrity gossip. After a recent bout of illness, and getting quite on in years, Miss Marple is constantly frustrated with the limitations she finds on herself, from her inability to tend her own garden to dropped stitches in her knitting, and worst of all, to her new live-in help, Miss Knight, insisted upon by nephew Raymond and Miss Marple's doctor. Miss Knight is always up in Miss Marple's grill and treats her like a senile child (does that make sense? well, she does). What Miss Marple needs is a good murder to consider, and soon a party at Gossington Hall provides her with just that!

Dolly gets invited to the party, since it's her own former house, and she's just about to meet the movie star, Marina Gregg, when Ms. Gregg's face freezes with what appears to be "dread" during a conversation with the woman in line in front of Dolly, Heather Badcock. The book's title comes from Dolly's description of Ms. Gregg's face at this time, like Tennyson's Lady of Shalott when the curse has come upon her. Just a few minutes later at the party, Heather Badcock drops dead, #MURDERED with poison in her daquiri! Turns out she had switched drinks with Ms. Gregg so everyone is like uh oh, looks like someone's got it out for you, Marina! While Miss Marple tries to work out what exactly happened, a few more people die (or disappear!) before she's able to work out just what it was that came upon Marina Gregg that day at the party. 

The YOA Treatment:

Honestly this is a rough week here in the states, and it feels a bit difficult to be cheerful and creative. Even so, it was nice to have a visit from one of our favorites, Miss Marple, who like a certain candidate we know, simply refuses to acknowledge anyone underestimating her, and just continues to do her thing like a boss #WEREWITHHER. 

At this point, Miss Marple is quite an old lady, which she was a bit when Agatha first started writing about her, but now she's been poking around solving mysteries for quite some time, and people are starting to reference her as "about 100 years old" and telling her she needs to take midday naps and try easier knitting patterns. While she's quite aware of her physical capabilities, she's also quite aware that mentally she's still sharp as a tack, so she has to do a bit of sneaking to let her detective flag fly, especially behind the back of her live-in help, Miss Knight, who is just #theworst. 

By the end of the book, though, Miss Marple has gathered about her some new allies, from police to her bright young housekeeper, Cherry, and has proved yet again that she's got what it takes to do her own thing, even if she needs a bit of help around the house now and then. I really enjoyed seeing her continue to hold her own, while being perfectly frank with herself about what she was and was not capable of. Sometimes that type of thing is depicted sadly, and with frustration, but the way Agatha wrote it came across as refreshing and encouraging, especially in a week when the ladies of the world could use a bit of encouragement. 

- E. 

Short Story Honesty & The Occult: Double Sin + The Golden Ball | 1961 & 1971

(image from here)

(image from here)

"Suddenly the child stirred. His eyes opened. He looked past his mother towards the open door. He tried to speak and she bent down to catch the half-breathed words. 'All right, I'm comin,' he whispered, then sank back. The mother felt suddenly terrified; she crossed the room to her father. Somewhere near them the other child was laughing. Joyful, contented, triumphant, the silvery laughter echoed through the room. 'I'm frightened, I'm frightened,' she moaned.

He put his arm around her protectingly. A sudden gust of wind made them both start, but it passed swiftly and left the air quiet as before.The laughter had ceased and there crept to them a faint sound, so faint as hardly to be heard, but growing louder till they could distinguish it. Footsteps -- light footsteps swiftly departing.

Pitter-patter, pitter-patter, they ran -- those well-known halting little feet. Yet -- surely -- now other footsteps suddenly mingled with them, moving with a quicker and lighter tread."
  - The Golden Ball and Other Stories, p. 166

The Sum of It:
More short stories for the both of us this week! We are kind of reaching our limit of clever-ish things to say about dear Agatha's short stories, so we decided to combine our two book posts this week and offer a little Halloween weekend twist on our latest reads.

But first, a little spotlight on some of the stories we read in Double Sin & Golden Ball. These two collections are both a smattering of all of Agatha's sleuths and styles. We have Poirot and Marple and James Bond (no, not THAT James Bond) and little romantic couples and CREEEPYYYY couples and cat people (yes, CAT PEOPLE) and the list goes on and on! The title story from Double Sin and Other Stories is a fun one. Poor over-worked Poirot (he just CAN'T say no to trivial cases because his little grey cells need stimulation!) agrees to go on a bus holiday with Hastings to get some R&R. Along the way they meet a nice girl named Mary who works in the antiques business with her kind aunt. Mary is on her way to meet up with an American collector who wants to buy a set of "valuable miniatures." When the group stops for lunch, Mary is sure she sees a man trying to steal her suitcase with the miniatures! She runs outside to confront the guy and he's like whoa, settle down, we just have the same suitcase (aka, my airport baggage claim nightmare.) Mary's like whoops, my bad, kind sir! HOWEVER, when they arrive at the hotel later that day, Mary is devastated to find out that her miniatures WERE STOLEN AFTER ALL! Have no fear, Poirot is here! (sayeth Poirot) and the vacationing sleuth gets to work finding his poor friend's treasures.

Double Sin is a rather fun collection if you want to have a bit of Poirot and a bit of Marple in your life. Some other fun stories from the book are Sanctuary (Miss Marple's vicar's wife pal, Bunch, heads into church to do some stuff and stumbles across a man DYING on the church floor. His mysterious last words are "sanctuary!" and something about jewels. Bunch gets in touch with Miss Marple straight away to help discover what happened to the poor man), and The Theft of the Royal Ruby (aka The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding - one of our favorites!)

The Golden Ball and Other Stories is a bit disappointing, to be honest. It's a mix of the not-so-great romantic mystery vignette stories from The Listerdale Mystery (some of them are seriously like, moralistic tales, it's weird) and some straight up #DARK ghost stories from The Hound of Death. We have had a running text conversation about our thoughts and feelings on these short stories and the stretches concerning Golden Ball were almost all Emily giving Audrey the basic creepy plot followed by exclamations of "WHAA?!?!" (Spoilery example: "One with a ghost gypsy who tries to save someone from a terrible fate by marrying him then turns out terrible fate is that he accidentally kills ghost gypsy then he dies too and they both are ghosts!" "WHAT. AGATHA STOP IT.") - essentially, if you're looking for some ghosty reads for Halloween, definitely give this a crack, because it's got all the haunted houses and ghost children your Halloween heart might desire (starting about midway through the book, with The Hound of Death). If you're looking for your typical Agatha short story gems, give this one a pass, and get yourself to Poirot Investigates.

The YOA Treatment:
In her Autobiography, Agatha discusses her mother's dabbling in the occult (in addition to several other religions, including Catholicism and Buddhism #wellrounded). Agatha talks about Mother Clara having a sense about danger and even sensing people's thoughts, and this interest transferred a bit to the daughter, as many of Agatha's early stories and some of her subsequent work followed her interest in spiritualism and paranormal activity.

Many of the tales in The Golden Ball (which was not published in the UK), which were pulled from the alternate collection The Hound of Death, concern the terrible mysteries of the paranormal world. Compared to Agatha's novels, these stories feel totally unusual, intentionally scary, as opposed to a who-dunnit style mystery. If you're in the market for a quick spooky tale to read aloud to your pals over the light of a flickering Jack-o-lantern this weekend, we can recommend The Lamp, or The Hound of Death.

- A. & E.

P.s. Don't forget to sign up for Booktrack and try out a fun way to experience Agatha, for free! Go back to our post from a few days ago to find the link for signup.