Nemesis by Agatha Christie

Miss Marple #12

Publisher: Harper Collins

305 pages

Own/Kindle

 

Blurb

 

A letter from beyond the grave

One last request

An unsolvable crime

When Miss Marple receives a letter from the recently deceased millionaire Jason Rafiel, she’s not sure what to make of it.

Knowing her deductive skills, he challenges her to solve a crime. If she does so, she will inherit £20,000.

The only problem is that he has failed to mention who was involved, or where, and when the crime was committed. Jane Marple is intrigued.

Never underestimate Miss Marple

 

Review

I must be honest and admit that I feel a little conflicted about Nemesis. Let’s start with the positives because they are many.

For me, this was one of Christie’s more ingenious plots. I loved how Marple was spoon-fed information, first to make her intrigued and subsequently to keep her nose pointed in the right direction. This setup did make me wonder if Mr. Rafiel had figured all the answers out for himself before he died and needed Miss Marple to set the record straight because he wouldn’t be around to do so. As much as I like that idea, this is probably a me-thing because no such suggestion is made in the story.

The characters in this story were vivid and the plot intrigued me as much as it fascinated Miss Marple. I couldn’t help rolling my eyes a little when Archdeacon Brabazon declares that he just knew Variety and Michael Rafiel had truly loved each other, but as a plot device and a further step towards the ultimate solution it worked charmingly. On the other hand, I adored descriptions like the following:

 

‘…a big man with square shoulders and a clumsy-looking body, looking as though he had been carelessly assembled by an ambitious child out of chunky bricks.’

 

I truly appreciated how Christie portrayed love as a dark force in this story. We are so used to love in books being the answer to problems, the thing that saves characters that it made a nice change to have love used as the driving force behind evil.

As I mentioned before, I’m a huge fan of the All About Agatha podcast. One of the two original podcasters, Catherine Brobeck had this theory about what she called ‘Dark Marple’. What a shame she didn’t live long enough to discuss this book. Not only does Marple’s darkness ‘shine’ in this story but it is also acknowledged by several other characters.

 

‘So gentle—and so ruthless.”’

And

‘The most frightening woman I have ever met.’

Statements by the Assistant Commissioner and the Home Secretary respectively.

What’s more, even Miss Marple herself considers the concept:

“‘D’you know, said Miss Marple to herself, ‘it’s extraordinary, I never thought about it before. I believe, you know, I could be ruthless’”

Finally, on the positive side, I want to give a huge shout-out to Miss Marple’s attitude towards the money she receives as her reward for solving the case. I love that she has no intention of saving it or using it for investments. Given the stage of life she has reached, spending her earnings on enjoying herself is just about perfect. I can’t help wondering what sort of adventures her plans might have brought Marple. Seems the opportunities would have been endless; if only Christie had written those stories.

But… I did have two issues with this story.

Until now I’ve been mostly able to ignore the parts of the story that the All About Agatha podcast calls, ‘stuck in their time’. In this story, I found myself less able to breeze over the descriptions of young girls and women. Somehow the fact that Christie would write so condescendingly about members of her own gender makes the sentiments voiced more painful.

Apparently, by this stage in her career, Christie dictated her books rather than typing them. And at times, it shows. Especially in the chapter where she explains what has happened and how she reached her conclusions, there are numerous repetitions, almost literal repetitions (😊), and it, unfortunately, stood out.

As much as those two things bothered me, they didn’t ‘kill’ my enjoyment and admiration for this story. The plot was very clever and the way the solution was reached was intriguing and surprising but overall plausible.

The above is more a collection of statements than a review, so I’ll end with a summary of my feelings about this story. Despite the dark theme, Nemesis was for me a delightful and intriguing mystery. As always it was an easy read with far more going on than is apparent at first glance. The solution was satisfying, and the final confrontational scene was nothing short of spectacular.

I do love me some Agatha Christie.

 

At Bertram’s Hotel by Agatha Christie

Miss Marple #11

272 pages

Publisher: Harper Collins

Publishing Date: January 1, 1965

Kindle edition

 

Blurb

A grand old London hotel

A series of alarming coincidences

Danger lurking down every corridor

Impeccable service. Luxurious rooms. Eccentric guests. There are worse places for Canon Pennyfather to find himself stranded than Bertram’s Hotel.

But when he gets his dates in a muddle and attempts to travel to Lucerne a day too late, he unwittingly sets off a violent chain of events.

And Miss Marple is convinced there is more going on than meets the eye.

Never underestimate Miss Marple

 

Review

This was a weird one. For starters, there isn’t all that much Miss Marple in this story. Almost all investigating is done by Scotland Yard, by Chief Detective- Inspector ‘Father’ Davy to be precise. What’s more, until the very end of the story, there is no murder. On the surface, there doesn’t appear to be any sign of crime being committed at all. If it wasn’t for a perspective shift to Scotland Yard, some way into the story, I would have been willing to believe that this was a story about Miss Marple enjoying a well-deserved holiday in London while staying in what appears to be a perfect hotel.

Since I mentioned Scotland Yard, this is what I wrote when they were first introduced: ‘Going out on a limb here (at 14%) but if Miss Marple is staying in Bertram’s Hotel and the police are looking for a criminal operational headquarters somewhere, the odds are, it’s right where good old Jane is.’

Back to the story. We’re introduced to a large cast of characters all staying in the hotel or connected to people staying there. The list is too long to mention everybody and for a very long time, it is unclear how everybody and everything ties together, if at all. In fact, for the longest time, this story appears to be not a whodunnit but instead a ‘whatonearthisgoingonit’. How do a train robbery, Bertram’s Hotel, Canon Pennyfather, a racing driver named Ladislaus Malinowski, Mr. Justice Ludgrove, Bess Sedgwick, and her estranged daughter Elvira tie together?

Fun fact while I’m mentioning the train robbery. It is interesting to note that this book was published about 16 months after the (in)famous great train robbery in the UK happened (August 1963).

I’m not going to try and relate everything that happened in the story. There is simply too much going on and if there is a way of summarizing it all without confusing others, it is beyond what I’m capable of. To be honest, I’m not convinced I totally got everything that was going on here, which is another reason this is a less satisfying Marple story.

That’s not to say I didn’t enjoy this read. What we did get from Marple’s point of view was as delightful as always. I thoroughly enjoyed her trips into London and the accompanying descriptions of shows and parks. She is also still as sharp as she’s always been. Even as she recognises how ‘perfect’ Bertram’s Hotel is—shortly after arriving courtesy of Raymond West and his wife Joan—and how well it matches memories from her childhood, she picks up on an unmistakable atmosphere of danger.

While I was disappointed Miss Marple was more or less on the sidelines of this investigation, Chief Detective-Inspector ‘Father’ Davy almost made up for that deficiency. If anything, he reminded me a little of Columbo from the TV series and was a very refreshing break away from Christie’s usual bumbling Scotland Yard characters.

This was by no means a bad book. I’m not sure Agatha Christie was capable of writing a bad or boring story. It simply wasn’t quite what I hope to find in a Miss Marple book.

Finally, because I apparently can’t write these Agatha Christie reviews without mentioning the All About Agatha podcast, I couldn’t help thinking about their ‘stuck in its time’ feature when the hotel was described. Not because there was anything offensive about it, but because the appeal of the hotel is very much that it is stuck in a time otherwise long past.

 

 

 

 

A Caribbean Mystery by Agatha Christie

Miss Marple #10

188 pages

Publisher: Agatha Christie Ltd / Planet Three Publishing

First Published: November 16, 1964

Library

 

Blurb

A Caribbean resort

Strangers thrown together

Is there evil in paradise?

Major Palgrave enjoys an audience, and, in Miss Marple, he discovers a captive audience too polite to walk away. But midway through recounting the tale of a multiple murder, he stops suddenly when something, or someone, catches his eye.

Then, when he’s found dead the following day, Miss Marple suspects that someone wanted to silence the talkative major. Permanently.

Never underestimate Miss Marple

 

Review

Miss Marple is on holiday in the Caribbean, organised and financed by her nephew Raymond West. While her stay certainly works wonders for her rheumatism, Miss Marple is bored…nothing ever happens. Things get a little more interesting when Major Palgrave digs out his wallet to show her the picture of a murderer, only to abort this action when he looks at something behind Miss Marple and appears to panic.

The next day, Major Palgrave is discovered dead and since he was old and was supposed to suffer from high blood pressure, his death is accepted as natural without question from anybody. Except for Miss Marple that is. When not long after a servant at the resort also dies, investigations into both deaths commence.

It’s fair to say that there’s no shortage of suspects in this book. There are many complicated and somewhat dodgy (love) entanglements among the guests, and gossip is rife. Miss Marple is struggling without one of her usual buddies to discuss the circumstances and suspects with. That is until she gets closer to Mr. Rafiel, a very old and filthy rich fellow guest on the island.

I rather liked Mr. Rafiel. He has a very low opinion of people in general and doesn’t care what others think about him. Why should he, given that he is indeed ‘filthy rich’? This quality makes him very open and honest. It also means that he is a good sounding board for Marple as soon as he realises that she isn’t the doddering old lady he first took her for.

It takes a third death for Miss Marple to fully understand what has been going on, and she’s only just in time to prevent a further murder.

I have no doubt that when I listen to the All About Agatha podcast later today, Kemper and Catherine will have criticism about all sorts of developments in this story. And that’s fair enough. How could they possibly rate all of Agatha Christie’s stories if they accepted each of them as absolutely wonderful? I, on the other hand, am on no such mission, which means that I can read these books for enjoyment only, without looking for faults or inconsistencies. As with the previous Christie titles I’ve revisited, I thoroughly enjoyed this book.

I’m having so much fun re-reading these stories. What makes it even better is that even when I do, vaguely, remember whodunnit, I most of the time have no idea how or why that could be possible. Which goes a long way towards explaining why I, who normally doesn’t enjoy re-reads because I already know the story, get so much pleasure from revisiting these mysteries.

The 4.50 From Paddington by Agatha Christie

 

Miss Marple #8

223 pages

Publisher: Agatha Christie Ltd/Planet Three Publishing

Library book

 

Blurb

For an instant the two trains ran together, side by side. In that frozen moment, Elspeth witnessed a murder. Helplessly, she stared out of her carriage window as a man remorselessly tightened his grip around a woman’s throat. The body crumpled. Then the other train drew away.

But who, apart from Miss Marple, would take her story seriously? After all, there were no suspects, no other witnesses... and no corpse.

 

Review

Poor Elspeth McGillicuddy. There she is, on a train to visit Miss Marple, when she witnesses a murder taking place in a passing train. She dutifully reports the crime to the police who duly investigate only to find no trace of evil doing. Since there appears to be no corpse and there are no other witnesses, they put her claim down to a bad dream. Miss Marple on the other hand, knows Elspeth and takes her claim seriously and after undertaking a few train journeys of her own, she has a pretty good idea of what may have happened to the body of the unfortunate victim. Miss Marple has no way of actively investigating the crime herself but, never one to be held back, she has a solution.

Enter…

Lucy Eyelesbarrow, who basically operates as Miss Marple’s eyes, ears, and legs is a fabulous character. First of all, there’s her name—Eyelesbarrow, how does Christie come up with names like this one? But most of all I love the idea that after successfully graduating from Oxford she decided to forgo a distinguished academic career to become a sort of highly skilled domestic labourer taking on jobs on a short-term basis for fast amounts of money.

Lucy Eyelesbarrow takes on a job in Rutherford Hall which happens to have grounds bordering the relevant train tracks and on a very expedient bend as well. Miss Marple takes up lodgings not too far away, allowing Lucy and later Detective Inspector Dermot Graddock to confer with her about what they discover and give voice to their frustration that the solution remains out of reach.

Apart from Lucy, Miss Marple, and Elspeth McGillicuddy, the following cast appears in this mystery and must therefore be considered suspects (with the exception of the investigating officers, of course):

Mrs. Kidder – Housekeeper

Mr. Crackenthorpe – Master of Rutherford Hall, invalid and very disagreeable and stingy with money.

Emma Crackenthorpe – Mistress of Rutherford Hall – Mr. Crackenthorpe’s daughter.

Edmund Crackenthorpe: Formerly the eldest son, killed in France during WW II.

Cedric Crackenthorpe – Middle son, a painter who lives abroad.

Harold Crackenthorpe – Youngest son, works in the City, married an Earl’s daughter.

Alfred Crackenthorpe – Eldest son, black sheep of the family.

James Stoddart-West – Alfred’s school friend.

Edith Crackenthorpe – Deceased daughter.

Mr. Bryan Eastley – Edith’s husband, still close with the family.

Master Alexander Eastley – Son of Edith and Bryan.

Dr. Quimper – GP.

Mr. Wimborne – Family Solicitor.

Martine – A French woman who might be the mysterious victim?

Inspector Bacon – Local Police

Detective Inspector Dermot Graddock – Scotland Yard and Sir Henry Clithering’s godson.

Lucy soon discovers that this is not a happy family. Mr. Crackenthorpe is rather stingy and seems to take delight in not helping his offspring financially, mostly because he feels hard done by as a result of his own father’s will. Unsurprisingly, his children, particularly his sons, aren’t all too fond of their father.

Two further murders take place later on in the story, which narrows the cast of suspects a little but it won’t surprise anybody when I say that the ultimate solution is rather surprising. It doesn’t come out of nowhere however, and looking back, the clues were there although I have to admit I missed them and failed to come up with the answers before Miss Marple revealed them in a rather shocking and delightful finale.

As I mentioned before, I really liked Lucy as a character. Another favourite was young Alexander because of his fascination with the crime and his determination to search for and find clues. While the other characters are all described vividly and come to life on the page, I can’t say I liked them very much. The three brothers were equally awful and selfish. Emma doesn’t show any selfishness but I found her a little bland, although that worked nicely in contrast to her brothers’ awfulness. I did like Dermot Graddock and the fact that his role in this story meant that Sir Henry Clithering got a mention in this book.

And that’s all I’m willing to say about this story. If you would like to know more you’ll have to read it. 😊

I picked this title because I’m currently listening to the All About Agatha podcast and this title is coming up soon. Past experience tells me that Catherine Brobeck and Kemper Donovan will be a lot more critical of this story, the characters, and the mystery than I am. In fact, if I have a criticism it is that Miss Marple doesn’t appear more prominently in this story. Other than that, this was a delightful mystery, well-plotted and executed, and a great read. Just what I would expect from the Queen of Crime.