Death on the Nile, by Agatha Christie
I knew I would enjoy this. When I was a bit younger, I relished a detective series called 'Murder Most Unladylike,' and the author Robin Stevens made no secret of the fact that she was heavily inspired by Agatha Christie. I have also seen a classic Christie play - the Mousetrap - live in the West End, and I loved it. 'Death on the Nile' is heralded as one of Christie's best ever mysteries, and I can certainly see why. Sophisticated, complicated, page-turningly tense. It was so good!
I quite liked the way Christie introduced the characters. One of the trickiest things I find about reading murder mysteries such as this is that there is always such a massive cast, and it is imperative that one remembers who they all are and what they are all like. But rather than having a cast list at the front (as I have seen in other murder mysteries) that one has to keep flicking back to, Christie showed us the characters interacting, in full scenes, nice and separate from all the other suspects, well in advance of the actual murder. I still had to concentrate quite hard to remember all the names, but this technique certainly helped!
I was surprised by how long it took for the murder to happen. Not only was there the long first section introducing all the characters before they even got on the Nile, but even once they were on the boat, no one died for ages! For about the first 150 pages, it wasn't really Death on the Nile but Mounting Tension and Suspicious Behaviour on the Nile. It became a bit of a guessing game to work out who was actually going to get murdered. But this long build-up was actually really effective, because it was by no means boring, and Christie spent all that time building up the characterisation, giving us a rich picture of both the individuals and their relationships with each other.
Most of the characters had violent tendencies, or suspicious habits, or mysterious pasts, and all of them treated Hercule Poirot as some sort of confidant, speaking with him honestly and spilling all (which I thought was a bit short-sighted of them really). They all, every one of them, were constructed to be the sort of person who had the potential to be guilty of murder. Genius!
In terms of guessing who-done-it, I am never right. I actually think I would be disappointed if it turned out I had guessed correctly; I enjoy the thrill of the surprising revelation. Keeping me in the dark is credit to the writer. With this one, it was so sophisticated that I really had no chance. I can honestly say that the correct murderer with the correct motive did at one point pass through my head, and there were a few suspicious things I picked up on that turned out later to be hugely important. But there were so many other hypotheses floating round in my mind that I really can't pretend I knew what was going on. The chapter when Poirot explains it all was so deliciously complicated that I had to go back and read it a second time! This was partly, I suspect, due to the fact that I was reading it very late at night, plus of course it was so tense that I had reached the point of unintentionally skipping words in my excitement to read on.
Having read Poirot's explanation twice, it made perfect sense. And although it would have been a greatly impressive feat to correctly work it out myself, I have to begrudgingly admit that all the facts were right there. Every single detail was woven in, in hints and clues and ambiguities and timing and dialogue earlier in the book. Flicking back through to the critical moments after having finished the book, and recognising that all the clues are in fact there, just proves that Christie has planned this all perfectly and put it all together so intricately. I am filled with admiration for her skill.
I heard an interview with Richard Osman a little while back - he is now an established crime writer himself. He was talking about how Agatha Christie murder mysteries are 'comfort crime' (if such a thing can exist!) - they're the kind of mysteries you can snuggle up with in an armchair and just ... relish. I could not agree more.