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3.94 AVERAGE
3.94 AVERAGE
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
mysterious
relaxing
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
N/A
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
emotional
lighthearted
mysterious
relaxing
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Esta vez pensé que sí, que la había pillado y sabía quién era el asesino…ni de lejos!!!
I can't give less than 5 stars to Agatha Christie's books. The style in which she creates the murders and the stories and all the background research about poisons it's simply amazing and it fascinates me!
Always trust your gut!
I had an inkling at the beginning who the killer was and then thought it was too obvious and changed it lol
I had an inkling at the beginning who the killer was and then thought it was too obvious and changed it lol
adventurous
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
One of my favorite Agatha Christie mysteries
Read this one a few months back, finally putting the review of it up on here.
It’s one of the most underrated of her novels. Premise is pretty straightforward. Famous womanising painter Amyas Crale is found poisoned at his country retreat shortly after he announces that he plans to leave his wife Caroline for his twenty year old muse/mistress. Caroline is convicted of the crime and dies in prison. Decades later, her daughter comes to Poirot and asks him to clear her mother's name.
Agatha Christie's stories are all about the strengths and flaws of eyewitness evidence; frequently she explores the idea that her detectives can solve a crime without ever visiting the crime scene but simply by talking to witnesses and picking apart their inconsistencies, psychologies and interpretations. And this is the purest distillation of it. The Five Little Pigs of the title refer to the five witnesses present on the day of Amyas's death, and it is their subjective recollections that allow Poirot to piece together the mystery.
All books have a tension between what the audience wants to read and what the author wants to write. And while the audience can come away satisfied with an abstract, Holmesian intellectual puzzle of untangling a mystery purely through prejudiced hindsight. Christie is also writing a book about Amyas Crale. Despite being dead in the present and distant in memories of the past, he dominates the book and the characters. It's why Christie not only gives us the Five Little Pigs's statements, she writers them all having hearts-to-hearts with Poirot about what happens. Crale is, eighty years on, still a very recognisable type, an arrogant, aloof narcissist whose charisma and talent draws people close and keeps them there no matter how badly he treats them. There's a strange dissonance in how most of the witnesses speak so fondly of Amyas while feeling queazy about his bad behaviour; this dissonance ends up being crucial to how the case is solved.
The ending is also strangely deconstructive of Christie's formula, showing what Poirot's style of deduction can and cannot do. One of the best of the Poirot novels, I’d recommend it to people who otherwise don’t like them.
It’s one of the most underrated of her novels. Premise is pretty straightforward. Famous womanising painter Amyas Crale is found poisoned at his country retreat shortly after he announces that he plans to leave his wife Caroline for his twenty year old muse/mistress. Caroline is convicted of the crime and dies in prison. Decades later, her daughter comes to Poirot and asks him to clear her mother's name.
Agatha Christie's stories are all about the strengths and flaws of eyewitness evidence; frequently she explores the idea that her detectives can solve a crime without ever visiting the crime scene but simply by talking to witnesses and picking apart their inconsistencies, psychologies and interpretations. And this is the purest distillation of it. The Five Little Pigs of the title refer to the five witnesses present on the day of Amyas's death, and it is their subjective recollections that allow Poirot to piece together the mystery.
All books have a tension between what the audience wants to read and what the author wants to write. And while the audience can come away satisfied with an abstract, Holmesian intellectual puzzle of untangling a mystery purely through prejudiced hindsight. Christie is also writing a book about Amyas Crale. Despite being dead in the present and distant in memories of the past, he dominates the book and the characters. It's why Christie not only gives us the Five Little Pigs's statements, she writers them all having hearts-to-hearts with Poirot about what happens. Crale is, eighty years on, still a very recognisable type, an arrogant, aloof narcissist whose charisma and talent draws people close and keeps them there no matter how badly he treats them. There's a strange dissonance in how most of the witnesses speak so fondly of Amyas while feeling queazy about his bad behaviour; this dissonance ends up being crucial to how the case is solved.
The ending is also strangely deconstructive of Christie's formula, showing what Poirot's style of deduction can and cannot do. One of the best of the Poirot novels, I’d recommend it to people who otherwise don’t like them.