mystery – Studio Libraries

“The impossible could not have happened, therefore the impossible must be possible in spite of appearances.”

During the course of last summer I read my second Agatha Christie book and I really enjoyed it; Death On The Nile is a great mystery novel and I have also reviewed it on the blog. While I really appreciated the twists and the setting, reading Murder On The Orient Express, my third Agatha Christie book, has been an even better experience, since I was already familiar with the character of Hercule Poirot and the writer’s style.

To me, this book confirmed Agatha Christie’s genius in building the plot and creating the right amount of suspense in the process of solving the case. I am very fascinated by the fact that, even though this novel was published in 1934, it feels very modern and the language used by Christie makes you feel like you were reading a modern novel, as if it were set in present times.

The book takes place aboard the Orient Express, a train that used to connect the Middle East to Europe in the first decades of the 20th century. The famous Belgian detective Hercule Poirot is traveling from Istanbul to London by train, along with a series of passengers that make for very interesting characters; they come from all different places and each of them has their secrets and peculiar traits. When a murder occurs, Poirot and the other passengers find themselves stuck on the train while traveling through Yugoslavia due to a heavy snowfall and it is very likely that the murderer is still on board.

As Poirot begins to investigate the murder, which immediately appears to be related to a crime case in the USA that occurred a few years before the events in the book, the passengers are being interrogated by the detective, and it is clear from the outset that most of them have something to hide… During this investigation, Poirot is accompanied by Monsieur Bouc, his old friend and director of the Wagon Lits; while Bouc immediately jumps to conclusions about who the perpetrator of the murder might be, Poirot prefers to wait until he is well informed about the facts before expressing an opinion on the matter.

death-on-the-nile — Image Credits: HarperCollins

“How true is the saying that man was forced to invent work in order to escape the strain of having to think.”

This was my first book by Agatha Christie (I had heard about her mystery novels over the years thanks to the Murder on the Orient Express 1974 film adaptation by Sidney Lumet), so I was a bit nervous when I began reading it because I didn’t know her writing style, therefore I didn’t know what to expect.

Death on the Nile takes place in 1937 on a cruise ship along the Nile; the rich and famous used to flock there at the time to see Cairo (which was considered very glamourous in the 1930s) and the Egyptian pyramids.

Linnet Ridgeway, a rich and famous heiress, is traveling to Cairo with new husband Simon Doyle for their honeymoon; Simon used to be her best friend Jacqueline de Bellefort’s fiancé and the two of them had previously asked Linnet for help in finding work (they were having a hard time because of the Depression). Linnet has basically stolen Simon away from Jacqueline so the latter won’t go down without a fight and is stalking them on their Egyptian honeymoon.

Aboard the same Nile cruise there happens to be Hercule Poirot, a famous Belgian detective who is the main character in a series of Agatha Christie mysteries.

The other passengers include a large cast of characters and they all have an intriguing past; Linnet’s trustee Andrew Pennington, her maid Louise Bourget, American socialite Marie Van Schuyler, her cousin Cornelia Robson and her nurse Miss Bowers, Tim Allerton and his mother Mrs. Allerton, communist Mr. Ferguson, romance novelist Mrs. Otterbourne and her daughter Rosalie, solicitor Jim Fanthorp, an Italian archaeologist named Guido Richetti and well-known physician Dr. Bessner.

It all seems to go rather smoothly until one night Linnet Doyle (née Ridgeway) is found murdered in her cruise cabin.

Tag: mystery

Murder On The Orient Express

Death On The Nile – Agatha Christie