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A review by sophiarose1816
Black Coffee by Agatha Christie
challenging
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
Someone stole the top secret plans and that person is one of the house party or servants. Sir Claude Amory determines to get them back so he puts them all in one room, shuts out the lights, and the guilty party can return the plans with no consequences. However, the lights go out, come on, and a body is the result. Poirot, Hastings, and Japp have their work cut out of them in this country house party whodunnit.
Agatha Christie's three-act play was adapted into a novel form by Charles Osborne. I've had it on the shelf for ages and hadn't read it yet, but then acquiring an audio copy was just the incentive to finally visit one of the few Christies I hadn't read yet.
Black Coffee had echoes of another short story of top secret plans going astray at a country house, but there were also a few significant differences, too. More than one person has motive and all have opportunity. Is the sister a simple chatterbox? Or the son merely bitter about his circumstances? What is the son's wife hiding? How was it done? Was the murder about the plans or something else entirely? What do the oddities in the witness accounts mean? So much for Poirot's little grey cells to process.
I enjoyed listening to Poirot, Hastings, and Japp reunite and get the case solved. John Moffat was a new to me narrator, but after a little adjustment, I ended up liking his work.
All in all, I was glad to give this adaption a try. It felt like Agatha Christie's work and was a clever mystery.
Agatha Christie's three-act play was adapted into a novel form by Charles Osborne. I've had it on the shelf for ages and hadn't read it yet, but then acquiring an audio copy was just the incentive to finally visit one of the few Christies I hadn't read yet.
Black Coffee had echoes of another short story of top secret plans going astray at a country house, but there were also a few significant differences, too. More than one person has motive and all have opportunity. Is the sister a simple chatterbox? Or the son merely bitter about his circumstances? What is the son's wife hiding? How was it done? Was the murder about the plans or something else entirely? What do the oddities in the witness accounts mean? So much for Poirot's little grey cells to process.
I enjoyed listening to Poirot, Hastings, and Japp reunite and get the case solved. John Moffat was a new to me narrator, but after a little adjustment, I ended up liking his work.
All in all, I was glad to give this adaption a try. It felt like Agatha Christie's work and was a clever mystery.