The Book
The ladies Willette throw an afternoon party in the smallest of small villages called Sittaford, where they have rented a house from the grumpy old man, Captain Trevelyan. While at the party, and since the Ouija board has not yet been popularized, they decided to play a ghostly game of table turning. A spirit is summoned, but she soon gets bored and leaves. With the game looking to fade away, another apparent spirit arrives. None other than Captain Trevelyan, claiming he has been murdered. Despite the lateness of the winter afternoon, and the certainty that it will snow before the six mile walk can be accomplished, Mr. Burnaby decides to walk to the next town over to make sure his best friend of over 40 years is alright. But when he gets there, low and behold, Captain Trevelyan is actually dead.
When his nephew Jim Pearson is arrested for his murder, Pearson's fiancée, Emily Trefusis works her considerable charm to clear her beloved. Along the way, she keeps tongues wagging as she flirts with all of the single young men in order to get them to help her. And it seems none of them can help but fall in love with her. The real question is will we?
My Thoughts
As far as stand alone puzzle mysteries go, this one is a fairly solid, if overstuffed outing from Agatha Christie. If you are a mystery novelist, a puzzle mystery or cozy mystery novelist at that, then this is a book to study. The clues are subtle, but there. And it is a delight to read. I got through the 271 pages in just over a day. The characters are well drawn and varied. The plot is a little bit of cheat, but if I told you how, it ruins the end. But all in all, a great book to read if you love mysteries, or if you write them. There is so much to learn.
As with most Christie novels, every suspicious clue leads to something in the subplots. As with all mysteries, but especially Christie, figure out the lies. Once you figure out the lies, and she usually ranks them from obvious to subtle and then mixes them together. Suspect everybody, and try to figure out what everybody is doing. I solved several of the side mysteries myself, and once I did that, I had no trouble figuring out who the murder was.
Reading through her books, I am not surprised that Christie is the best selling author of all times. She really does make up a fiendishly hard puzzle, stick to the rules, and imparts a sense of fun while reading her books. When they aren't tedious. The thrillers tend to fall into the category from time to time.
How Much My Library Card Saved Me
Once again, I had to have this book shipped to me from Evanston as my library does not own a copy of the book. Or rather, I should say, does not own an individual copy of the book. Since I'm not going to check out a collection just to read one novel, I had to go elsewhere. This is made of the same stuff as Murder at the Vicarage, but it is in much better condition. This William Morrow First Paperback Edition dates to 2012. What's interesting is how the back matter, those things published on the last couple of pages of a book have changed. In paperbacks, it used to be mail in forms to order more books, now it's the codes to order straight from the website. I'm watching the publishing industry change before my very eyes, and if I hadn't started talking about it for the blog, then I don't think I would have ever thought about it. The cover says the book cost $12.99
This Book $12.99
This Summer $586.85
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The Book
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