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Agatha Christie - Page 11
Agatha Christie
The Mysterious Affair at StylesThe Mysterious Affair at Styles


Paperback - Pan (1954)
Hardback
HarperCollins (1998)
The Mysterious Affair at Styles
See Review by Martin Edwards - creator of the highly acclaimed, Liverpool based Harry Devlin Mysteries
THE MYSTERIOUS AFFAIR AT STYLES was Agatha Christie's first detective-story-and it introduced Hercule Poirot. Agatha Christie's vast public will understand after reading this tale why the charming, courteous little Belgian with his egg-shaped head and impressive moustache has become the best-known detective of fiction since Sir Arthur Conan Doyle created Sherlock Holmes.
Poirot is with several Belgian refugees who are in an Essex village as guests of Mrs Inglethorp, owner of Styles Court. This old lady has recently -  and rather surprisingly - married for the second time, and her black-bearded husband (many years younger than she is) is heartily disliked by her two stepsons, John and Laurence Cavendish. John's wife, Mary, is friendly with Dr Bauerstein, a sinister-looking London specialist who is an expert on poisons and who is recuperating from a nervous breakdown. A strange atmosphere of tension pervades Styles Court. Mrs lnglethorp is agitated. She retires to her room one evening, and her husband takes a cup of coffee to her. During the night she becomes ill and dies from strychnine poisoning. Poirot is summoned. He finds curious clues - crushed fragments of a coffee-cup, a stain on the floor, a few threads of a dark green fabric, a small piece of half-charred paper which appears to be part of a will, and an old envelope with the word 'possessed' written on it several times-spelt first incorrectly and then correctly. As Poirot pursues his inquiries, the case grows more and more complicated; but finally an innocent person is saved from the gallows and the murderer is revealed by a brilliant piece of guesswork on Poirot's part.
Agatha Christie's technique is superb. she never cheats, though she admits that she sometimes says "things that can be taken two ways."

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