I read Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie for the first time this month as part of Read Christie 2026 with the Official Agatha Christie site.
I’ve read plenty of Christie’s books already but have always steered clear of the “big ones” that everyone knows because I’ve usually seen the movies and know the stories. I have learned, though, that there can be changes in the movies and sometimes they aren’t always for the better.
One example was And Then There Were None. If you have not read that one, you really need to, even if you saw any of the movies. It was the first Christie I read and … whoa. I sat there at the end feeling horrified and in awe at the same time. What a twisted, but well-written story.
(An aside…anyone who doesn’t think Agatha disappeared for 11 days as a way to get back at Archie and buys the whole “temporary amnesia” story hasn’t read enough of Agatha’s books. The woman had a million ideas how to get back at someone and how to kill them. If you don’t know what I am talking about – do a quick online search. It’s like the plot of one of her books but actually real life.)
For those who have never read this one, here is simple summary: a group of people end up stranded on the Orient Express (a train in Europe) during a blizzard when one of them is murdered. Too bad for the murderer, renowned detective Hercule Poirot has hopped on at the last minute and is working hard to solve the case while everyone waits for help to arrive.
What is so funny in the Poirot books is how Poirot always expects everyone to know who he is, and most people look at him in confusion when he introduces himself.
It’s always like, “Surely you must know me,” and then the other person looks confused and says, “No, I’m afraid not.”
Here are some actual quotes from the book that I enjoyed:
“Mon ami, if you wish to catch a rabbit you put a ferret into the hole and if the rabbit is there he runs. That’s all I have done.”
***
“When he passed me in the restaurant,” he said at last. “I had a curious impression. It was as though a wild animal — an animal savage, but savage, you understand — had passed me by.”
“And yet he looked altogether of the most respectable.”
“Precisement! The body — the cage — is everything of the most respectable — but through the bars, the wild animal looks out.”
***
“But I know human nature, my friend, and I tell you that, suddenly confronted with the possibility of being tried for murder, the most innocent person will lose his head and do the most absurd things.”
***
“You’ve a pretty good nerve,” said Ratchett. “Will twenty thousand dollars tempt you?” It will not.”
If you’re holding out for more, you won’t get it. I know what a thing’s worth to me.”
I, also M. Ratchett.”
What’s wrong with my proposition?”
Poirot rose. “If you will forgive me for being personal – I do not like your face, M. Ratchett,” he said.”
***
“All around us are people, of all classes, of all nationalities, of all ages. For three days these people, these strangers to one another, are brought together. They sleep and eat under one roof, they cannot get away from each other. At the end of three days they part, they go their several ways, never, perhaps, to see each other again.”
***
I’ve already read my Christie for this month, but I’ve tossed Crooked House in the mix as an extra Christie read because my husband recommended it.
In April, I’ll be reading a Miss Marple — A Caribbean Mystery.
Have you read this one or any Christie books? If you have read her books, do you have a favorite?
If you write book reviews or book-related blog posts, don’t forget that Erin and I host the A Good Book and A Cup of Tea Monthly Bookish Blog Party. You can learn more about it here.
On Thursdays, I am part of the Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot blog link party. You can find the latest one in the sidebar to the right under recent posts.
I also post a link-up on Sundays for weekly updates about what you are reading, watching, doing, listening to, etc.
Hello! Welcome to my blog. I am a blogger, homeschool mom, and I write cozy mysteries.
You can find my Gladwynn Grant Mystery series HERE.
Today’s prompt is: Books on My Spring 2026 To-Read List
I already shared a post about what books I have on my spring hopeful list, so today I am narrowing the list down to the top ten from that list that I definitely want to read, even though I know other books will probably catch my attention along the way.
A note for this post: it does contain affiliate links. Clicking the link does not mean that you will pay more for the item, only that I make a tiny commission if you make a purchase from that link.
I’ve read other Miss Read books and enjoyed them so wanted to try this one.
Discover the little English village that neighbors Fairacre, in a novel that’s “enchanting, lovely, gentle, pointed, and charming” (Minneapolis Sunday Tribune). Miss Read’s charming chronicles of English small-town life have achieved legendary popularity, providing a welcome return to a gentler time with “wit, humor, and wisdom in equal measure” (The Plain Dealer). Welcome to Thrush Green, the neighboring village to Fairacre, with its blackthorn bushes, thatch-roofed cottages, enchanting landscape, and jumble sales. Readers will enjoy meeting a new cast of characters and also spotting familiar faces as they become immersed in the village’s turn of events over the course of one pivotal day: May Day. All year, the residents of Thrush Green have looked forward to the celebration. Before the day is over, life and love, and perhaps eternity, will touch the immemorial peace of the village.
I keep saying I am going to read this one and just never do it! This spring I want to actually read it!
Our moral consciousness and moral judgements are proof to the human race that a moral being exists—God.
Mere Christianity explores the core beliefs of Christianity by providing an unequaled opportunity for believers and nonbelievers alike to hear a powerful, rational case for the Christian faith. A brilliant collection, Mere Christianity remains strikingly fresh for the modern reader and at the same time confirms C. S. Lewis’s reputation as one of the leading writer and thinkers of our age.
The book brings together Lewis’ legendary broadcast talks during World War II. Lewis discusses that everyone is curious about: right and wrong, human nature, morality, marriage, sins, forgiveness, faith, hope, generosity, and kindness.
These are always fun reads so I need at least one per season if not one per month!
Description: Jessica is on the Hawaiian island of Maui, giving a lecture on community involvement in police investigations. Her co-lecturer is legendary retired detective Mike Kane, who shares his love of Hawaiian lore, legends, and culture with Jessica. But the talking stops when the body of a colleague is found at the rocky foot of a cliff.
Mala Kapule, a botanist and popular professor at Maui College, was known for her activism and efforts on behalf of the volcanic crater Haleakala. Plans to place the world’s largest solar telescope there split the locals, with Mala arguing fiercely to preserve the delicate ecology of the area.
Now it’s up to Jessica and Mike to uncover who was driven to silence the scientist…and betray the spirit of aloha.
Description Described by the queen of mystery herself as one of her favorites of her published work, Crooked House is a classic Agatha Christie thriller revolving around a devastating family mystery.
The Leonides are one big happy family living in a sprawling, ramshackle mansion. That is until the head of the household, Aristide, is murdered with a fatal barbiturate injection.
Suspicion naturally falls on the old man’s young widow, fifty years his junior. But the murderer has reckoned without the tenacity of Charles Hayward, fiancé of the late millionaire’s granddaughter.
This is my April read for the Read Christie 2026 Challenge.
Description: As Miss Marple sat basking in the Caribbean sunshine, she felt mildly discontented with life. True, the warmth eased her rheumatism, but here in paradise nothing ever happened.
Eventually, her interest was aroused by an old soldier’s yarn about a murderer he had known. Infuriatingly, just as he was about to show her a snapshot of this acquaintance, the Major was suddenly interrupted. A diversion that was to prove fatal.
I am reading this one with Erin from Still Life, With Cracker Crumbs.
Description: At the age of six, little orphan Heidi is sent to live with her grandfather in the Alps. Everyone in the village is afraid of him, but Heidi – fascinated by his long beard and bushy grey eyebrows – takes to him immediately and soon earns his love in return. She adores her life in the mountains, playing in the sunshine and growing up among the goats and birds, but one terrible day Heidi is collected by her aunt and forced to live with a new family in town. Heartbroken by the loss of her Alpine life, she must do everything she can to return to her grandfather.
Description: By mistake, Nancy Drew receives a letter from England intended for an heiress, also named Nancy Drew. When Nancy undertakes a search for the missing young woman, it becomes obvious that a ruthless, dangerous man is determined to prevent her from finding the heiress or himself. Clues that Nancy unearths lead her to believe that the villainous Edgar Nixon plans to marry the heiress and then steal her inheritance.
Little Miss and I will be reading this for school.
Description: Rascal is a beloved, autobiographical children’s book by Sterling North, published in 1963, that tells the heartwarming story of a boy’s year-long friendship with a pet raccoon in 1918 Wisconsin. The book, a Newbery Honor winner, chronicles the adventures of young Sterling and his mischievous companion, exploring themes of nature, family, and a changing world as the boy navigates life with his father after his mother’s death.
I’ve really enjoyed his Jeeves series so we will see about this one.
Description: P. G. Wodehouse’s charming tale of a taxi driver who falls in love with a wealthy woman who rides in his cab. Hilarity and antics ensue when he arrives at her rural estate.
This one may take me a bit as it does seem long, but I am very interested in it.
Version 1.0.0
Description:
Back in print in the exclusive authorized edition, is the engaging and illuminating chronicle of the life of the “Queen of Mystery.” Fans of Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple and readers of John Curran’s fascinating biographies Agatha Christie’s Secret Notebooks and Murder in the Making will be spellbound by the compelling, authoritative account of one of the world’s most influential and fascinating novelists, told in her own words and inimitable style. The New York Times Book Review calls Christie’s autobiography a “joyful adventure,” saying, “she brings the sense of wonder…to her extraordinary career.”
Have you read any of these?
If you write book reviews or book-related blog posts, don’t forget that Erin and I host the A Good Book and A Cup of Tea Monthly Bookish Blog Party. You can learn more about it here.
On Thursdays, I am part of the Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot blog link party. You can find the latest one in the sidebar to the right under recent posts.
Hello! Welcome to my blog. I am a blogger, homeschool mom, and I write cozy mysteries.
You can find my Gladwynn Grant Mystery series HERE.
I’m surprised more people don’t talk or write about Agatha Christie’s non-fiction books, especially Come, Tell Me How You Live, which reveals so much of her witty sense of humor.
Of course, she only wrote three non-fiction books — this one, her autobiography, and The Grand Tour, a collection of her letters and photographs from her 1922 tour to promote the British empire.
Christie writes this book under her full name of Agatha Christie Mallowen, with Mallowen being the name of her second husband and she’s wrong in her introduction.
I don’t read non-fiction often so I wasn’t sure I would enjoy this one but when the opening pages describe Agatha looking for outfits she can wear on her husband’s archaeological dig in Syria and the clerk lets her know they might not be able to accommodate her larger size, which Agatha handles hilariously, I knew I had to keep going.
As Agatha says in the intro of this book, “This is not a profound book. It will give you no interesting sidelights on archaeology, there will be no beautiful descriptions of scenery, no treating of economic problems, no racial reflections, no history. It is, in fact, small beer — a very little book, full of everyday doings and happenings.”
This book does actually include some beautiful descriptions and a few interesting sidelights on archaeology.
Agatha started writing this book before World War 2 and finished it afterward, sending it out into the world to be published.
As I mentioned already, the book begins with Agatha looking for traveling clothes. Her humor immediately kicks in.
“Shopping for a hot climate in autumn or winter presents certain difficulties. One’s last year’s summer clothes, which one has optimistically hoped will “do”, do not “do” now the time has come. For one thing, they appear to be (like the depressing annotations in furniture removers’ lists) “Bruised, Scratched, and Marked.” (And also Shrunk, Faded, and Peculiar!). For another — alas, alas that one has to say it! — they are too tight everywhere.
So, to the shops and the stores and:
“Of course, Modom, we are not being asked for that kind of thing now! We have some very charming little suits here — O.S. in the darker colors.”
I’m guessing O.S. means oversized because Agatha then writes: “Oh, loathsome O.S. How humiliating to be O.S.! How even more humiliating to be recognized at once as O.S.!”
If I have done my math right, Agatha would have been around 45 at the time this trip was taken.
She and her husband, Max, traveled to Syria and Iraq. Max was an archaeologist and Agatha actually met him on an archaeologist dig in 1930, years after divorcing her cheating first husband, Colonel Archibald Christie.
What’s so fun about this book is how Agatha writes about different she and Max approach situations in life, with her being a bit more high strung and him being laid back and acting like everything will turn out all right. Agatha was about 15 years older that Max, I might add, which I did not realize while I was reading the book. I read that while I was researching for the review. No wonder he seemed so aloof and laid back. He was still young and a bit naïve in some ways.
In addition to sharing details of her marriage, Agatha also writes about the quirky men who travel with her and her husband.
I would not be surprised if some of the people they worked with or met along their travels popped up in Agatha’s mysteries.
Mac, her husband’s architect assistant, gets the bulk of the secondary character playback throughout the book and it is hilarious. His full name was Robin Maccartney.
Mac is extremely serious, a perfectionist, and also lacks any sense of humor.
Agatha and Max traveled off and on between 1935 and 1936, with stays in Syria long enough that they had a house remodeled for them to stay in. Mac, an architect by trade, has been designing blueprints for Agatha’s bathroom.
“I ask Mac that evening at dinner what is fist architectural job as been.
“This is my first bit of practical work,” he replies. “—your lavatory!”
He sighs gloomily, and I feel very sympathetic. It will not, I fear, look well in Mac’s memoirs when he comes to write them.
The budding dreams of a young architect should not find their first expression in a mud-brick lavatory for his patron’s wife!”
Agatha shares some of her most savage lines in the book when she is writing about Mac, who almost seems uptight and perfect to be human at times.
It isn’t until he can’t light a gas lamp that he has a meltdown which Agatha says reveals his humanity.
“I steal a glance at him when another five minutes have gone by. He is getting warm. He is also looking not nearly so superior. Scientific principal or no scientific principal the petrol lamp is holding out on him. He lies on the floor and wrestles with the thing. Presently he begins to swear… A feeling that is almost affection sweeps ove me. After all, our Mac is human. He is defeated by a petrol lamp!”
Agatha writes that from that point on, Mac is one of them, someone who can easily get frustrated and swear about it.
Agatha did take her typewriter and some manuscripts with her and writes about working on a book while there. One of their friends, Louis Osman, an architect and member of the archaeological team, who was affectionately nicknamed “Bumps” by the group, and who Agatha simply calls “B” in her book, came into her office one day to chat, but she wants him to leave because she’s in the middle of writing a murder scene.
“He goes into the drawing office and talks to Mac, but, meeting with no response, he comes sadly into the office, where I am busy on the typewriter getting down to the gory details of a murder.
‘Oh,’ says B. “you’re busy?”
I say, ‘Yes,’ shortly.
“Writing?” asks B.
‘Yes’ (more shortly).
‘I thought, perhaps,’ says B wistfully. ‘I might bring the labels and the objects in here. I shouldn’t be disturbing you should I?’
I have to be firm. I explain clearly that it is quite impossible for me to get on with my dead body if a live body is moving, breathing and in all probability talking, in the near vicinity!
Poor B goes sadly away, condemned to work in loneliness and silence. I feel convinced that, if B ever writes a book, he will do so most easily with a wireless and a gramophone turned on close at hand and a few conversations going on in the same room!”
Agatha also tells about the women of the middle east and how they want to get to know her and learn more about her. I was surprised to learn in this section that Agatha had had a series of miscarriages over the years, which may be one reason she and Archie only had one daughter.
There are some parts of the book I found a tiny bit slow but so much of it was so fascinating that I didn’t mind a little bit of slowness
I really enjoyed Agatha’s recollections and her thoughts about the faith of the people compared to the faith of the people in England.
I also found it interesting to read her views on public education, which would probably surprise people today.
After sharing about watching some of the village children play and experiencing every day life she wrote:
“I think to myself how happy they look, and what a pleasant life it is like the fairy stories of old, wandering about over the hills herding cattle, sometimes sitting and singing. At this time of day, the so-called fortunate children in European lands are setting out for the crowded classroom, going in and out of the soft air, sitting on benches or at desks, toiling over letters of the alphabet, listening to a teacher, writing with cramped fingers. I wonder to myself whether, one day a hundred years or so ahead, we shall say in shocked accents: ‘In those days they actually made poor little children go to school, sitting inside buildings at desks for hours a day! Isn’t it terrible to think off! Little children!’”
Have you ever read this one or any of Agatha’s non-fiction books?
The Secret of Chimneys by Agatha Christie is the first of two books which feature Superintendent Battles and in the autumn my husband picked me up a gorgeous copy of it during a trip to a Barnes and Noble about 90 minutes away.
I had looked at the copy the year before so the gift was exciting and I enjoyed reading it as my third book this year.
Anthony Cade dominated the majority of the story, more so than Battle, and I was fine with that. He was a blast and had all the best lines. For some reason, I kept picturing Cade as Hugh Fraser, who plays Colonel Hastings in the Poirot TV show and movies, as I was reading.
From what I have read about this series, this is also where we Agatha readers meet Bundle – real name Lady Eileen Brent, but I also didn’t feel she dominated much of the story either. I read that she is even more in the second book of this duology, Seven Dials, which was recently released as a mini-series on Netflix. No, I haven’t seen it as I don’t a subscription to Netflix.
Sh was a fun addition who I would have liked to seen more of in the book really. So many Agatha fans seem to love her. This is not a complaint in anyway. Just an observation of a character I liked and wanted more of. I believe I will get that in the second book.
This one features a ton of political intrigue and some call it more of a thriller than a detective/crime fiction book, like many of Agatha’s other books. There is also a bit of romance, though, and I found the romance so sweet and the romantic lines swoon-worthy.
A quick description from the Agatha Christie site: A young drifter finds more than he bargained for when he agrees to deliver a parcel to an English country house. Little did Anthony Cade suspect that a simple errand on behalf of a friend would make him the centerpiece of a murderous international conspiracy.”
Chimneys, by the way, is the name of the house/estate – not an appendage on a roof.
Here are some quotes from the book that I enjoyed:
“Detective stories are mostly bunkum,” said Battle unemotionally. “But they amuse people, he added, as an afterthought. And they’re useful sometimes.”
“In what way?” asked Anthony curiously.
“They encourage the universal idea that police are stupid. When we get an amateur crime such as a murder, that’s very useful indeed.”
***
‘Lord no. It’s the red signal again. When I first saw you—that day in Pont Street, I knew I was up against something that was going to hurt like fun. Your face did that to me—just your face. There’s magic in you from head to foot—some women are like that, but I’ve never known a woman who had so much of it as you have. You’ll marry someone respectable and prosperous, I suppose, and I shall return to my disreputable life, but I’ll kiss you once before I go—I swear I will.’
***
“I wouldn’t go so far as to say I’ve got a plan. But I’ve got an idea. It’s a very useful thing sometimes, an idea. – Superintendent Battle
***
“You understand well enough, I dare say,” said Anthony, breaking the silence. “You know when a man’s in love with you. I don’t suppose you care a hang for me – or for anyone else – but, by God, I’d like to make you care.”
As for the mystery, I didn’t fully guess the guilty party but was starting to get an idea of who certain people really were toward the end of the book.
Have you read this one? What did you think?
If you write book reviews or book-related blog posts, don’t forget that Erin and I host the A Good Book and A Cup of Tea Monthly Bookish Blog Party. You can learn more about it here.
On Thursdays, I am part of the Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot blog link party. You can find the latest one in the sidebar to the right under recent posts.
I also post a link-up on Sundays for weekly updates about what you are reading, watching, doing, listening to, etc.
If you would like to support my writing (and add to the fund for my daughter’s online art/science classes), you can do so here.
Hello! Welcome to my blog. I am a blogger, homeschool mom, and I write cozy mysteries.
You can find my Gladwynn Grant Mystery series HERE.
It’s time for our Sunday morning chat. On Sundays, I ramble about what’s been going on, whatthe rest of the familyand I have been reading and watching, andwhat I’ve been writing. Some weeks I share what I am listening to.
Latey I’ve become even more diligent about calming my nervous system and one way I am doing that is by choosing when I see or hear national or international news.
Previously, if I logged into my Chrome app on my phone headlines popped up at me and I was hit full in the face with some horrible headline about some horrible thing going on in the world.
Two days ago I found a way to change the home screen so there are no news headlines slamming me in my face first thing. I didn’t know I could do that before but it has been so helpful. Now all that pops up are sites I visit the most and none of those are news sites.
If I do visit news sites, I am trying to do it briefly on my laptop and for only about two minutes.
I have also been trying to read more and watch TV less. If I watch TV it is usually All Creatures Great or Small, an old detective show, or old movies.
I listen to light, older/classic books and even childrens’ books (like Winnie the Pooh) while doing dishes or housework.
Worship music a few times a week has been a must lately but I have not always been doing that like I should.
I feel much calmer when I listen to worship music at some point during my day but the earlier the better because then the song is stuck in my head throughout the day and I can sing it when I feel stressed.
I have a couple of devotionals in my kindle I want to start but I also want to get some hard copies of devotionals so I can underline and write in the margins.
This past week was fairly calm with me visiting my parents a couple of times to visit and help clean up and with doing school with Little Miss. Our most productive school day was Thursday because we discussed the end of the Civil War and other historical subjects.
The other days of the week we focused on math, trying to figure out what book we want to read next for Literature, and Little Miss attended the four classes and two clubs she has online.
What I/We’ve Been Reading
Just Finished
This week I finished Miss Read’s Village School by Miss Read and The Secret of Chimneys by Agatha Christie.
They were both very good and made up for my first read of the year, My Beloved by Jan Karon, which I did not enjoy (unlike her previous 14 books, which I did very much enjoy).
The Secret of Chimneys was more like an international mystery than her normal mysteries, but I liked that even more.
I do have to say — a lot of rich people get murdered in her books. Ha! She was a member of the upper class in England, but I think she had a grudge to,o because she was frequently killing off the richest or the people who wanted to be the richest. That wasn’t the actual case in this latest one, so I didn’t spoil anything, but the mystery does involve rich and powerful people who want things kept a secret.
In Progress
I am now reading Miss Read’s Village Diary, which is similar to Village School. It follows Miss Read, a teacher at a small, rural school and the mix of characters around her. It is just a simple, calm book, without a deep plot. It’s perfect for what I want to read right now.
I’ve also started The Blue Castle for a re-read.
Up Soon
I hope to continue The Tiger in the Smoke by Margery Allingham because I started the first few pages to see if I liked it and got pulled right in.
After that I am going for lighter fare with a Murder, She Wrote book, but I am not sure which one yet. I have one that takes place in Hawaii and that might be a good one to help me forget about how cold it is right now where I live.
What The Family is Reading
Little Miss and I are starting The Singing Tree by Kate Seredy.
The Husband is reading The Housemaid is Watching by Frieda McFadden.
What I/We’ve Been Watching
This past week I watched a movie called It Happened Tomorrow about a man who receives a newspaper that tells him the future, and it changes his entire life. It is a lighthearted film, and I would guess it was movie behind the idea for the show from the 1990s with a similar plot. The movie starred Dick Powell and Linda Darnell.
I also watched The Million Pound Note with Gregory Peck. It wasn’t too bad. A bit strange, but cute and fun. I originally was going to write that this was only the third Gregory Peck movie I have watched, but then I did a search to remind me the name of the one movie and saw others of his I had watched, starting with The Guns of Navarone, which my mom really likes. The second was Roman Holiday. Then it was To Kill A Mockingbird a couple of years ago and then this movie.
I watched the first episode of the sixth season of All Creatures Great and Small Friday night at the end of a very relaxing time of reading and cuddling under a warm blanket with a dog next to me and a cat on my chest.
Little Miss and I also watched the first episode ever of Little House on the Prairie, at her request.
I also watched “10 ways to live like a Grandma in 2025” On the Real Vintage Dollhouse YouTube channel.
Erin (Still Life, With Cracker Crumbs) and I host a monthly bookish link party called A Good Book and A Cup of Tea. This link-up is for book and reading posts or anything related to books and reading (even movies based on books!). Each link party will be open for a month. You can find that link up for this month here.
Each week, I host the Weekend Traffic Jam Reboot with some great hosts. It goes live Thursday night but you can share any kind of blog posts (family-friendly) there until Tuesday of each week. You can check my recent posts on the sidebar to the right for the most recent link-party.
Now It’s Your Turn
What have you been doing, watching, reading, listening to, or writing? Let me know in the comments or leave a blog post link if you also write a weekly update like this.
Angela Lansbury once said in an interview that one of the more exciting moments of her career was working with Bette Davis in Death on the Nile (1978).
That’s the movie I watched this week for my Summer of Angela feature.
The movie is full of A-list movie stars: Angela, Bette, David Niven, Maggie Smith, Mia Farrow, and, of course, Peter Ustinov as Hercule Poirot.
I’m not a fan of Ustinov as Poirot since David Suchet plays the part so brilliantly, and I can’t see anyone else as Poirot, but the movie is still okay overall. I only added it to my watch list because Angela is in it. I had fun watching her be absolutely over the top as an eccentric romance writer and Maggie Smith be an overall jerk throughout, which is a role that she seemed to always play well.
Mia Farrow was …er…creepy as always.
Let’s talk about the plot a little for those who aren’t familiar with this one from either the book by Agatha Christie or the movie.
The online description:
“On a luxurious cruise on the Nile River, a wealthy heiress, Linnet Ridgeway (Lois Chiles), is murdered. Fortunately, among the passengers are famed Belgian detective Hercule Poirot (Peter Ustinov) and his trusted companion, Colonel Race (David Niven), who immediately begin their investigation. But just as Poirot identifies a motley collection of would-be murderers, several of the suspects also meet their demise, which only deepens the mystery of the killer’s identity.”
Angela portrays an eccentric romance writer named Salome Otterbourne who based a character in one of her books on Linnet. She and Linnet confront each other on the boat and Linnet tells Salome she’s going to sue her for libel. Just about everyone on the boat seems to have an issue with Linnet, which makes me wonder how they all ended up on the boat together. Planned or just coincidence, I don’t know, but they all seem to know each other and Linnet is angry with just about everyone and they are angry with her.
Salome is on the boat with her daughter Rosalie who is embarrassed by her mother’s behavior.
Angela’s character isn’t in the movie as much as other characters, but when she is, she certainly fills the screen with her crazy personality and outfits.
She makes all kinds of semi-suggestive comments about possible couples or what people need to do to feel more relaxed. Some of the characters refer to her books as “lurid.”
At one point, she and her daughter talk about whether or not Poirot would know her from her books. Rosalie says, “Somehow, I don’t think Monsieur Poirot is a very keen reader of romantic novels, Mother.”
Mrs. Otterbourne responds: “Well, of course he is! All Frenchmen are. They’re not afraid of good, strong sex!”
She is such an obnoxious character that after the murder occurs David Niven’s character comments to Poirot: “What a perfectly dreadful woman. Why doesn’t somebody shoot her, I wonder?
Poirot responds, “Perhaps one day, the subscribers of the lending libraries will club together and hire an assassin.”
The film was shot on location in Egypt so many of the experiences the characters had were actually had by the actors and actresses. I think some of the reactions that were filmed when they were climbing on the donkeys and camels were totally adlibbed because they were so authentic and funny.
According to TCM, makers of the film were trying to cash in on the success of the 1974 film Murder on the Orient Express, also based on an Agatha Christie book. That cast was also star-studded with Lauren Bacall, Ingrid Bergman, and Anthony Perkins.
Unfortunately, while Murder on the Orient Express brought in $27.6 million, this movie only grossed $14.5 million in the U.S. and Canada. Despite the lackluster success at the time it was released, many Christie fans see it as one of the better adaptations of the book — at least according to the many comments about it that I read online.
One thing that might have made the movie less of a success was the filming locations.
TCM.com stated this in an article about the movie: “Despite the exotic locale, split between Egypt and London, filming conditions for the movie were less than ideal. Filmed on a little boat called The Carnock, the actors took a speedboat back and forth each day from their hotel in Aswan down river to the shooting location. The Carnock was also apparently too small for all the actors to have their own dressing rooms. One unpleasant incident involved Bette Davis, Olivia Hussey and some Eastern chant records Hussey liked to play early in the morning. After Davis asked Hussey not to play her music, it was reported that the actresses did not speak to each other again while aboard The Carnock. If tensions weren’t high enough, the temperature climbed well above 100 degrees everyday and filming often was halted at noon.”
What Angela said about the movie:
As I mentioned in the beginning of this post, Angela remembers what a delight it was to work with Bette Davis.
“She was a very fascinating woman,” Angela told Studio Canal. “I got to know her quite well on that occasion. She had been a great, great Warner Brothers star and I had been a fan of hers as a child. She was a great deal older than me and I remembered her and all her great roles.”
Angela remembered Bette as being a “special and unique” actress.
“Unique looking and sounding and I was delighted to meet her and work with her.”
Angela also reflected on working with Ustinov who was her ex-brother-in-law.
“My role was such an interesting, farcical character anyways and there was so much comedy involved,” she said. “David Niven and Peter Ustinov and myself and my husband and I, we were all great friends and knew each other from other times.”
As for the conditions, Angela confirmed that they were not very nice at times.
“We were billeted in a hotel in the middle of the Nile,” she said. “To get to it, we had to get on a boat, having to cross water. We all lived in this luxury hotel in the middle of the Nile in Egypt and that was a special and wonderful experience I would say. I mean you couldn’t have been more comfortable. Swimming pools, wonderful food, everything you could possibly want and then we would get 4 or maybe 3 in the morning because of the heat at the time in Egypt. We had to do the shooting before noon. Otherwise, it would be too hot. So, we were dealing with that and also an old riverboat we were working on which was trundling its way down the Nile, pulled by little boats and sometimes under its own steam.”
The boat made so much noise, though, that it was often tugged along by the little boats, she said.
The only dressing room in the bottom of the boat in a four-bed cabin.
“It was a bed up and a bed down, so the fittings had to take place between the two beds,” Angela said. “I remember that Bette would lie down on one bunk and Maggie Smith was on the other and I was on the third. We would take turns being fitted in the ‘well’, in the middle. It was one of those extraordinary circumstances where we forced to not be the stars we were supposed to be.”
The costumes in this movie were amazing and were designed by Anthony Powell, who won an Oscar for his work on the film (the film’s only award). Angela had nothing but praise for him.
“My costumes on that film I thought were absolutely extraordinary and quite original and marvelous,” she said. “They were built in New York City by my friend Barbara Matera and he worked with her and we all worked together and we came up with this extraordinary look but Anthony was at the root of it all.”
I have to agree that her costumes were dazzling and something else. Not sure I’d ever wear them, but they fit her character for sure.
You can see the full interview here:
My thoughts:
I watched this one in pieces because it comes in at a whopping 2 hours and 20 minutes!! I didn’t remember it being that long when I first watched it with my husband, but, thinking back, I seem to remember we watched one half one night and the other half the next night.
While I did enjoy the movie, and watching Angela’s antics when she was on screen, the movie was really too long for my taste. I know they needed to take us down some twists and turns to keep us guessing but two and a half hours? Gah!
Also, what always gets me about these movies is how a bunch of people can die (the number of deaths in this one was excessive if you ask me and I’d like to read the book to see if Agatha wrote that many deaths) and at the end everyone just shrugs it off. I won’t give it away but there was one death in particular that just got waved off as no big deal at the end with the characters smiling and walking away arm in arm. So bizarre and left me wondering if the person they said killed that person wasn’t actually someone else.
In addition to Angela’s performance, I loved the witty and sarcastic banter between Maggie Smith and Bette Davis’ characters.
Maggie’s character, Miss Bowers, was supposed to be Bette’s nurse and companion. Bette portrayed Marie Van Schuyler, a socialite. Maggie was horrible to Bette’s character, though! It was sort of crazy but also hilarious. They had some of the best exchanges.
“Mrs. Van Schuyler: Come on, Bowers, time to go. This place is beginning to resemble a mortuary.
Miss Bowers: Thank God you’ll be in one yourself before too long, you bloody old fossil!
***
Mrs. Van Schuyler: Shut up, Bowers. Just because you’ve got a grudge against her, or rather her father, no need to be uncivil.
Miss Bowers: *Grudge*? Melhuish Ridgeway ruined my family!
Mrs. Van Schuyler: Well, you should be grateful. If he hadn’t, you would have missed out on the pleasure of working for me.
Miss Bowers: I could kill her on that score alone!
Miss Bowers was definitely not a respectful employee, but I think that Mrs. Van Schuyler liked that.
One other observation: This movie seems to feature a lot of scenes of rich people sitting around in drawing rooms, all dressed up with nowhere to go. I’m very confused why they got all dressed up to sit around every night together and then just go to bed. Didn’t any of them own clothes that weren’t fancy? Of course, I’m teasing here because I really did love the outfits for the women. The dresses were all so eye-catching.
Trivia or Facts About the movie:
According to producer Richard Goodwin, Bette Davis brought her own make-up, mirrors, and lights to Egypt. (source IMdB)
Peter Ustinov was David Niven’s personal attendant during World War II. Ustinov was a private and Niven was a Lt. Colonel (various sources)
Location shooting in Egypt consisted of four weeks on the riverboat “S.S. Karnak” and three weeks filming in places such as Luxor, Cairo, Aswan, and Abu Simbel. (various sources)
Ustinov portrayed Poirot five more times. (various sources)
Albert Finney was initially asked to reprise his role as Poirot from Murder on the Orient Express (1974). However, he had found the make-up he had to wear for the first movie very uncomfortable in the hot interior of the train, and on realizing that he would have to undergo the same experience, this time in temperatures exceeding 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 degrees Celsius), he declined the role. (source IMdB)
Angela Lansbury had never seen the finished film until she attended a 40th Anniversary screening on November 9, 2018. (source IMdB)
Dancer Wayne Sleep, relatively unknown at the time, choreographed the tango scene. He reported in 2018, “I was being paid an hourly rate, which was great as nobody turned up to the rehearsal and I had to go and find David Niven and persuade him to come.” (source IMdB)
Producer John Brabourne said no telephones were available while on-location in Egypt. They had to communicate by telex. . (source IMdB)
Agatha Christie was inspired to write the source novel in 1937, during an Egyptian vacation. The hotel scenes were shot at the Old Cataract Hotel in Aswan, where Christie stayed. The hotel’s front had to be “redressed” to appear more 1930s, and the furniture on the hotel’s terrace was replaced with custom period-authentic pieces. (source IMdB)
Notable quotes:
Jacqueline De Bellefort: Simon was mine and he loved me, then *she* came along and… sometimes, I just want to put this gun right against her head, and ever so gently, pull the trigger. When I hear that sound more and more…
Hercule Poirot: I know how you feel. We all feel like that at times. However, I must warn you, mademoiselle: Do not allow evil into your heart, it will make a home there.
Jacqueline De Bellefort: If love can’t live there, evil will do just as well.
Hercule Poirot: How sad, mademoiselle.
***
Mrs. Van Schuyler: [Remarking on Linnet’s pearls] Oh, they’re beautiful!
Linnet Ridgeway: Thank you.
Mrs. Van Schuyler: And extraordinary, if you know how they’re made. A tiny piece of grit finds it’s way into an oyster, which then becomes a pearl of great price, hanging ’round the neck, of a pretty girl like you.
Linnet Ridgeway: I never thought of it that way.
Mrs. Van Schuyler: Well, you should. the oyster nearly dies!
***
Jim Ferguson (to Rosalie): Karl Marx said that religion was the opium of the people. For your mother, it’s obviously sex.
***
Miss Bowers: I think a shot of morphia will meet the case. I’ve always found it very effective when Mrs Van Schuyler is carrying on.
***
Mrs Otterbourne: I suppose that uncouth young man will appear now and attempt to seduce you. Well, don’t let him succeed without at least the show of a struggle. Remember, the chase is very important.
Rosalie Otterbourne: Oh, mother!
Mrs Otterbourne: I tell you that I, Salome Otterbourne, have succeeded where frail men have faltered. I am a finer sleuth than even the great Hercule Porridge.
Have you seen this one? What did you think?
Here is what is left of my Summer of Angela:
August 1 – The Court Jester
August 8 – The Picture of Dorian Gray
August 15 – A Life At Stake
August 22 – All Fall Down
August 29 – Something for Everyone
If you want to read about some of the other movies I watched you can find them here:
I know I talk a lot on here about Agatha Christie, but I actually have not yet read a ton of her books. Quite a few, but not a ton.
Most of the Agatha Christie books I have read have been either Poirot or Miss Marple mysteries. I decided to read The Pale Horse, which is not about either of those sleuths when the Agatha Christie official website suggested it a few months back as one of the challenges for their 2024 reading challenge. I have not kept up on that challenge this year but might try for the remainder of the year.
This month they are suggesting Come, Tell Me How You Live, which is a memoir of Agatha’s travels with her husband Archie. This is perfect timing because I have been watching Travels with Agatha Christie with Sir David Suchet and though he isn’t talking about this book in the show, it would still tie into her traveling. The book he actually mentions would have focused on her trip with her husband Archie and this book was written after she remarried years later. It’s actually listed under Agatha Christie Mallowan. I will probably have to order it new or through Thriftbooks, but I think it would be a fun read.
Anyhow, on to The Pale Horse.
I didn’t actually read the description of this book before I started it but as I was getting into it I saw a review of it and became a little nervous. The review mentioned that it deals with the occult and seances, etc., and that is just not my thing. I decided to plow forward, though, and in the end the book did mention those topics but — without giving too much away — that is not where the story landed, shall we say.
The story is written in both third and first person, which threw me off a bit.
We start with a man named Mark Easterbrook trying to write a mystery and switch to an actual mystery when a dying woman asks for a priest to come so she can tell him something before she dies. We don’t know what she tells him, but we know that he is murdered shorty before she does tell him.
Eventually we are led back to the man we met in the first chapter and he finds himself trying to figure out why the priest was murdered and what three creepy women living together in an old inn called The Pale Horse, might have to do with his murder and the mysterious deaths of several others in the community.
When the priest died, he had a list of last names in his shoe and the police are eventually joined by Easterbrook to find out who the people on the list are or were. Sadly, some of them are in the past tense and Easterbrook is worried that if he doesn’t hurry up and figure out what is going on, more of them will be in the same tense.
One of Mark’s friends is a mystery writer, Mrs. Oliver, and she is friends, sort of, with the creepy women but she doesn’t enjoy the way they talk about occult and seances, etc. In this scene I am Mrs. Oliver:
Thyrza shot her a quick glance.
“Yes, it is in a way.” She turned to Mrs. Oliver. “You should write one of your books about a murder by black magic. I can give you a lot of dope about it.”
Mrs. Oliver blinked and looked embarrassed.
“I only write very plain murders,” she said apologetically
Her tone was of one who says, “I only do plain cooking.”
“Just about people who want other people out of the way and try to be clever about it,” she added.
I wasn’t sure where the book was going part of the time and that made me a bit nervous and I got even more nervous when Mark and a new friend of his decided they would set up the people they thought might be involved in the murders. I was also caught up in it all before that but was biting my nails (literally) once the plot moved to entrapment.
I’ve mentioned before that one thing I am not a fan of when it comes to Agatha is how she doesn’t add a lot of description of surroundings or characters. I don’t like a ton of description in my books but a little more than what she offers sometimes would be nice. Her lack of description was not an issue for me in this book, which felt like a more well-rounded novel to me than some of the ones from the series.
A description example I don’t remember reading much in other of her novels I have read (which remember is very few):
The vicarage sitting room was big and shabby. It was much shaded by a gargantuan Victorian shrubbery that no one seemed to have had the energy to curb. But the dimness was not gloomy for some peculiar reason. It was, on the contrary, restful. All the large shabby charis bore the impress of resting bodies in them over the years. A fat clock on the chimneypiece ticked with a heavy, comfortable regularity. Here there would always be time to talk, to say what you wanted to say, to relax from the cares brought about by the bright day outside.”
A couple of other quotes I enjoyed from the book:
“My husband’s a very good man,” she said. “Besides being the vicar, I mean. And that makes things difficult sometimes. Good people, you see, don’t really understand evil.” She paused and then said with a kind of brisk efficiency. “I think it had better be me.”
“People are so proud of wickedness. Odd, isn’t it, that people who are good are never proud of it? That’s where Christian humility comes in, I suppose. They don’t even know they are good.”
I considered Hermia disapassionately across the table. So handsome, so mature, so intellectual, so well read! And so — how could one put it? So — yes, so damnably dull!”
“Yes,” I said. “The supernatural seems supernatural. But the science of tomorrow is the supernatural of today.”
Have you read this one? What did you think?
Lisa R. Howeler is a blogger, homeschool mom, and writes cozy mysteries.
You can find her Gladwynn Grant Mystery series HERE.
The Body in the Library (A Miss Marple Mystery) by Agatha Christie
Description:
It’s seven in the morning. The Bantrys wake to find the body of a young woman in their library. She is wearing an evening dress and heavy makeup, which is now smeared across her cheeks. But who is she? How did she get there? And what is the connection with another dead girl, whose charred remains are later discovered in an abandoned quarry?
The respectable Bantrys invite Miss Marple into their home to investigate. Amid rumors of scandal, she baits a clever trap to catch a ruthless killer.
My impressions:
The Body In the Library is a very interesting and complex mystery that kept me turning the pages.
Part of the Miss Marple series by Agatha Christie, the book tells the story of a high society family who wakes up to find the dead body of a young woman they don’t know in their library.
The wife, Mrs. Dolly Bantry, is quite thrilled with the discovery and contacts her friend Jane Marple to help investigate, even though Col. Melchett and Inspector Slack, as well as Superintendent Harper are on the case.
“What I feel is that if one has got to have a murder actually happening in one’s house, one might as well enjoy it, if you know what I mean,” Dolly tells Miss Marple.
Despite Mrs. Bantry’s fascination with it all, this is a serious crime and how serious it is becomes more apparent as the days go on. How it is going to affect her husband is becoming more clear as well. The town gossip starts up immediately. A dead body in the library of Col. Arthur Bantry? Well, well. Maybe the old man was a bit of a pervert having an affair and things went wrong, eh?
Miss Marple doesn’t think so, but she keeps her ideas mostly to herself. In the mean time Melchett, Slack, and Harper are busy questioning potential suspects and their points of view carry us through most of the story. Harper, does, however, suggest that Miss Marple be consulted.
He tells Melchett at one point, “Downstairs in the lounge, by the third pillar from the left, there sits an old lady with a sweet, placid, spinsterish face and a mind that has plumbed the depths of human iniquity and taken it all as in the day’s work….where crime is concerned, she’s the goods.”
The inspector laughs this off but as the book goes on we realize that Miss Marple enjoys being underestimated and has been formulating her idea of who is guilty all along. She even steps in for a little sly sleuthing herself, pretending to simply be a concerned neighbor. She has experience in these things because of all the “goings on” in the little village she lives in, she says, and likes to use references to those situations to draw conclusions about the current mystery.
I enjoyed the twists and turns of this one, things I didn’t see coming. I had the mystery possibly solved before the end, but that didn’t take away from the enjoyment of hearing Miss Marple explain how she’d decided who the guilty party was.
Like in Murder in the Vicarage, my first Miss Marple read last year, I wanted there to be more Miss Marple in this book because she is so fun. At the same time I like how she is always a more subtle character who the investigating officers always have to consult, whether they want to or not.
Lord Edgware Dies by Agatha Christie is a wild ride full of Hollywood starlets, mistaken identities, greed, trickery, and hilarious verbal sparring between Arthur Hastings and Poirot.
This is the second Poirot book I’ve read and I thoroughly enjoyed it.
This is the story of the death of Lord Edgware, whose wife – American actress Jane Wilkinson — declares she’d like to kill him – maybe hit him with her car so she can marry another man. The focus on the suspect flies right to her when he is found dead in his library the next day – stabbed in the neck.
There are other suspects in the play too, though – his nephew Ronald Marsh who wants his uncle’s fortune, his daughter who Lord Edgware wasn’t very nice to, an actress named Carlotta Adams who does an amazing impression of Jane Wilkinson, and even Lord Edgware’s secretary.
Jane is the obvious suspect, though, because she asked Poirot if he would go to her husband and ask him for the divorce she’s been asking for so she can remarry.
Originally, she wanted a divorce to marry an actor but now it is a duke. Poirot agrees to meet with Lord Edgware, who informs him that he’s already told Jane she could get a divorce.
The problem with Jane being the suspect is that she was seen at a dinner party the night her husband was killed and there is a witness who says he heard and saw her receive a phone call at exactly the time of the murder.
This spins the case right on its head.
Before the book is done there will be more than one murder, more than one suspect, and a big reveal scene at the end that twists and turns the reader to the answer.
Hastings reveals his affectionate aggravation with Poirot during the book, including how Poirot constantly talks about how he (Poirot) needs to go sit and use his “gray matter.”
“I have noticed that when we work on a case together, you are always urging me on to physical action, Hastings. You wish me to measure footprints, to analyse cigarette ash, to prostrate myself on my stomach for the examination of detail. You never realize that by lying back in an armchair with the eyes closed one can come nearer to the solution of any problem. One sees then with the eyes of the mind.”
“I don’t,” I said. “When I lie back in an armchair with my eyes closed one thing happens to me and one thing only!”
“I have noticed it!” said Poirot. “It is strange. At such moments the brain should be working feverishly, not sinking into sluggish repose. The mental activity, it is so interesting, so stimulating! The employment of the little grey cells is a mental pleasure. They and they only can be trusted to lead one through fog to the truth…”
While I enjoyed this book very much, I was bothered by the many negative or stereotypical references toward Jewish characters in the book. I apparently downloaded a copy to my Kindle where they hadn’t taken these references out since such references were edited out from some versions years ago.
A quick search online revealed a complicated relationship between Agatha and her views on Jews – views that partially came from the attitudes toward Jews of the wealthy class of people she was a part of in Great Britain. Agatha did indeed have some antisemitic views but also wrote about Jews being wealthy in a good way in her books – like that they were bright so that is how they were able to be so wealthy. She used a seriously disturbing number of tropes against them in this particular book, often calling them shrewd and money-hungry – but then seeming to say being shrewd was a good thing.
At one point in Lord Edgware Dies Poirot says, “Misfortune may always be waiting about to rush upon us. But as to your question, Miss Adams, I think, will succeed. She is shrewd and she is something more. You observed without a doubt she is Jewish?”
Hastings says he hadn’t but now that he thinks about it he does “see the faint traces of Semitic ancestry.”
Poirot continues, “It makes for success – that. Though there is still one avenue of danger – since its danger we are talking of.”
“You mean?” Hastings asks.
“Love of money,” Poirot tells him. “Love of money might lead such a one from the prudent and cautious path.”
So while we have a stereotype here, we also have a compliment, making it confusing what Agatha is really trying to say about Jews. The fact she continues to negatively reference Jews throughout the book (one has the traditional big Jewish nose, one character comments), is awkward but she also seems to assign some positive elements to those characters, as well as showing admiration of those who are Jewish from other characters in the book.
According to information I read online, an autobiography about Agatha details a few stories that point to her apparent antisemitism, including one during World War II when a high-ranking British official involved with the Nazi party commented that all Jews should be killed. This is said to be a moment when Agatha was shocked at the idea of killing anyone based on their ethnicity or faith and she was appalled at the comment. Her portrayal of Jews changed some after that incident. Nothing I read can definitively say that Agatha didn’t like Jews, blacks, or any other race she described in a stereotypical way in her books, plays, and short stories. Some critics, and even her own family members, feel that she was writing about how certain groups were described at that time, not that she herself felt hatred toward any group.
There are, however, repeated negative references to Jewish people in this particular novel and I struggled to be simply entertained by the story because of them. After feeling uncomfortable with the continued references, I did read a very interesting article by a writer named Benjamin Ivry on Forward.com. Forward.com is a site focused on Jewish culture. In summary, Ivery said that some of the language against Jews Agatha used in her writing was wrong and stereotypical but that many Jews still enjoy Agatha’s work, seeing it as a product of a time when many ethnicities were not respected. May of Jews can still see the brilliance in Agatha’s plots, while recognizing her propensity to overgeneralize Jewish stereotypes, he said.
In his article, he wrote: “Christie specialist Gillian Gill was unequivocal:
‘A kind of jingoistic, knee-jerk anti-Semitism colors the presentation of Jewish characters in many of her early novels, and Christie reveals herself to be as unreflective and conventional as the majority of her compatriots… Christie’s anti-Semitism had always been of the stupidly unthinking rather than the deliberately vicious kind. As her circle of acquaintances widened and she grew to understand what Nazism really meant for Jewish people, Christie abandoned her knee-jerk anti-Semitism. What is more, even at her most thoughtless and prejudiced, Christie saw Jews as different, alien, and un-English, rather than as depraved or dangerous – people one does not know rather than people one fears.”
Jane Arnold likewise observed that in Christie’s writings, “No particular Jewish characteristic is completely negative.” This ambiguity may have been due in part to an incident recounted in Christie’s autobiography. In 1933, she accompanied her husband, an archaeologist, to the Middle East for an excavation. There they met Julius Jordan, Germany’s Director of Antiquities in Baghdad. When someone mentioned Jews, Jordan retorted: “Our [German] Jews are perhaps different from yours. They are a danger. They should be exterminated. Nothing else will really do but that.”
Christie’s reaction was to stare at Jordan “unbelievingly” and observe to herself: “There are things in life that make one truly sad when one can make oneself believe them.” The UK National Archives website further explains that Julius Jordan was Nazi Party leader and propaganda director for Iraq. So Christie had encountered the local equivalent of Joseph Goebbels.
While Christie was shocked at the idea of Jews being killed, a Jewish journalist, Chrisopher Hitchens, later said when he attended a dinner with Christie and her husband in the 1960s the conversations about Jews was still “vividly unpleasant.”
Ivry says for many Jews, Agatha remains “a recreational delight.”
Indeed, in an article in the Canadian Jewish News, journalist Michael Taube writes: “Was Christie a racist or an anti-Semite? Her family and friends always denied it. They argued that most of the characters who made intolerant remarks were, in fact, seen in a negative light in her works. That’s true, which means she was more likely a product of her times than a hateful soul.”
As for my personal opinion, I enjoy Agatha Christie’s novels and plan to keep reading them. Since I was never able to speak to the woman herself and will never have the chance I will hold on to hope that the negative references she made toward Jews and other ethnicities were simply what others have said they were – ignorance or a reflection of the character saying them.
