books_cats_etc 's review for:

Cards on the Table by Agatha Christie

4.0

funny lighthearted mysterious fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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The story:

Mr Shaitana is a man who prides himself on knowing other people's secrets. So when he boasts to Poirot that he has a collection, not of objects related to murder, but of murderers themselves, the great Belgian sleuth is more than a little uneasy. Invited to a party to 'view the exhibits', Poirot is joined by seven other guests. Four of them are detectives, of one sort or another. So that must mean the other four are more than they seem...

Four players will sit down to a game of bridge. By the end of the night, there will be a murder that only one of them could have committed. But which?

My thoughts:

This month's theme for #ReadChristie2025 is 'Detectives', and we are spoilt with them in this book! Not only do we have Poirot, but we see the reappearance of two characters introduced in earlier novels — the solid and slightly stupid-seeming Superintendent Battle (who appears in five Christie novels, first in "The Secret of Chimneys", and who featured in last month's read, "The Seven Dials Mystery"); and the adventurous Colonel Race (who appears in four Christie novels, the first being "The Man in the Brown Suit"). We are also treated to the very first appearance of mystery novelist Ariadne Oliver (a character humourously based on Christie herself), who will go on to feature in six more Christie novels, all but one of them alongside Poirot.

This is a clever mystery, as there are almost no clues to go on... The very unlikable Mr Shaitana (we are not sorry to see him murdered!) invites eight people to a party — four 'detectives', represented by Poirot (private), Battle (Scotland Yard), Race (Secret Service [unconfirmed!]) and Oliver (fictional), and four alleged murderers. The two groups sit down to games of bridge in two separate rooms, with Shaitana sitting by the fire in the room with the murderers. By the end of the evening, he is dead, and with no one having entered the room, one of the four must have done it. But there is nothing to go on beyond the characters and histories of the four suspects, something which each of our detectives then goes about tackling in their own particular styles.

I thought perhaps that there was one twist too many at the end of this book, but it was good for each of the potential murderers stories to be resolved, and overall this is a really excellent mystery that keeps you guessing all the way!