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Again Poirot shows how clever he is, this time because his perfect secretary starts getting typing errors. It's amusing how he is half in awe of her, half in fear of her. Set in a hostel with a mixed group, this intriguing story wasn't like other mysteries by her that I've read. He's called in because of a bizarre list of items stolen, but murder comes across eventually. As the Poirot Buddy Read draws to a close (5 books to go) after 2 and a half years I am still happily surprised when I come across a book, that not only do I not remember but I thoroughly enjoy and give 5 stars to. A feature length television film adaptation, starring David Suchet as Poirot was broadcast in 1995 as episode 2 of series 6 in the series Agatha Christie's Poirot.

In the UK the novel was first serialised in the weekly magazine John Bull in six abridged instalments from 28 May (Volume 97, Number 2552) to 2 July 1955 (Volume 98, Number 2557) with illustrations by "Fancett". [6] Agatha Christie also wrote romance novels under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott, and was occasionally published under the name Agatha Christie Mallowan. This novel is set at a student hostel. Poirot is initially asked to investigate petty thefts and vandalism in the hostel, and easily discovers that most of these acts were committed by resident Celia Austin. Then Celia is murdered.Philip John Stead's review in the Times Literary Supplement of 23 December 1955 began: "Poirot's return to the happy hunting grounds of detective fiction is something of an event. He is called upon to solve the mystery of a series of apparently trivial thefts at a student's hostel but soon finds himself partnering the police in investigating murder. Mrs Christie rapidly establishes her favourite atmosphere by her skilful mixture of cheerfulness and suspense." After summarising the plot he concluded, "The amount of mischief going on in the hostel imposes some strain on the reader's patience as well as on Poirot's ingenuity; the author has been a little too liberal with the red herrings. Yet the thumb-nail sketches of the characters are as good as ever and in spite of the over-elaborate nature of the puzzle there is plenty of entertainment." [4] Residents of a student hostel are puzzled by the meaning of a series of senseless and seemingly unrelated thefts of no particular value or obvious intent. But Hercule, with a carefully considered application of the “little gray cells”, of course, is worried that it may be otherwise. Then an apparent suicide from an overdose of morphia and a subsequent murder make it obvious that the problem is much more than the work of a mean-spirited prankster. Before long, Poirot’s mental sleuthing leads him beyond the group of young students and into the sinister world of international drug smuggling. In late 1926, Agatha's husband, Archie, revealed that he was in love with another woman, Nancy Neele, and wanted a divorce. On 8 December 1926 the couple quarreled, and Archie Christie left their house, Styles, in Sunningdale, Berkshire, to spend the weekend with his mistress at Godalming, Surrey. That same evening Agatha disappeared from her home, leaving behind a letter for her secretary saying that she was going to Yorkshire. Her disappearance caused an outcry from the public, many of whom were admirers of her novels. Despite a massive manhunt, she was not found for eleven days.

The Secret of Chimneys - The Seven Dials Mystery - Cards on the Table - Murder is Easy - Towards Zero In this 32nd book in the 'Hercule Poirot' series, the detective investigates mysterious occurrences at a rooming house. Like all Agatha Christie books, it can be read as a standalone. John Bull serialised in six abridged instalments from May 28 (Volume 97, Number 2552) to July 2, 1955 (Volume 98, Number 2557) with illustrations by "Fancett". [1] Hercule Poirot is asked to investigate a rash of theft and vandalism at a boarding house for students and young workers. The opinionated statements by Christie about the suspects and her constant defense as to the innocence of one suspect was a bit tiresome and this deliberate attempt at misleading the readers was not too pleasing. Poirot's ingeniousness was in its best element, and he solves the mystery which was baffling to both the police and the readers. But even with Poirot, certain inferences that he made sounded too fantastic. For example, his knowledge of the contents of a certain letter by a dying man to his solicitor, the true relationship between two characters, came out of the blue without any previous hint as to how Poirot could draw such a conclusion. Also, the student characters were so stereotyped which made them uninteresting.This best-selling author of all time wrote 66 crime novels and story collections, fourteen plays, and six novels under a pseudonym in romance. Her books sold more than a billion copies in the English language and a billion in translation. According to Index Translationum, people translated her works into 103 languages at least, the most for an individual author. Of the most enduring figures in crime literature, she created Hercule Poirot and Miss Jane Marple. She atuhored The Mousetrap, the longest-running play in the history of modern theater. In 1930, Christie married archaeologist Max Mallowan (Sir Max from 1968) after joining him in an archaeological dig. Their marriage was especially happy in the early years and remained so until Christie's death in 1976. Philip John Stead's review in the Times Literary Supplement of 23 December 1955 began: "Poirot's return to the happy hunting grounds of detective fiction is something of an event. He is called upon to solve the mystery of a series of apparently trivial thefts at a student's hostel but soon finds himself partnering the police in investigating murder. Mrs. Christie rapidly establishes her favourite atmosphere by her skilful mixture of cheerfulness and suspense." After summarising the plot he concluded, "The amount of mischief going on in the hostel imposes some strain on the reader's patience as well as on Poirot's ingenuity; the author has been a little too liberal with the red herrings. Yet the thumb-nail sketches of the characters are as good as ever and in spite of the over-elaborate nature of the puzzle there is plenty of entertainment."

A bunch of boarders, mostly students and young folk, get into a bit of mischief which turns out to be more than just a bit of mischief. Pretty soon several people connected to the boarding house are dead and residents' dark secrets start to come to light.

To me this seemed like one of Agatha Christie's less developed (and more obvious) plots with not quite believable motivation for many of the characters. Still, it was an entertaining light mystery. When the students are attempting to place Hercule Poirot, during Chapter 4, one of them mentions the case retold in Mrs McGinty's Dead (1952). When Poirot comes to lecture to the students about his cases in the same chapter, he retells the story of The Nemean Lion, published in book form in The Labours of Hercules (1947). In chapter 5 Poirot also remembers Count Vera Rossakoff’s "exotic splendour...even in decay", something that he has only observed in The Capture of Cerberus, also from The Labours of Hercules. In Chapter 21, Poirot visits a solicitor by the name of Mr. Endicott to confirm his suspicions of Nigel Chapman. Endicott says to Poirot, "...I'm deeply in your debt. You cleared up that nasty Abernethy business for me." This may be a reference to the events in After the Funeral (1953), though Abernethie is mistakenly spelt "Abernethy" and not "Abernethie" as it is in After the Funeral. Furthermore, the catalyst to Poirot's direct involvement to the events in After the Funeral is a solicitor named Entwhistle, not Endicott Hungarian: Gyilkosság a diákszállóban (Murder in the Dormitory) – for the Poirot film: A kisegér mindent lát (The Little Mouse Can See Everything) First off I do understand the criticism aimed at this book. There are too many characters for such a short book and as such hardly any of them are fleshed out. Also Poirot plays a relatively minor role and a lot of the interrogations are actually carried out by his inspector friend (although it is Poirot who finally pieces everything together). An intriguing beginning gone awry and a clever plot defiled by implausible events is all I could say about this novel of the Poirot series. The idea of a possible kleptomaniac in a student hostel sounds interesting, isn't it? Yes, it is. And this original theme attracted me very much to the story. It started well, I must say, with the problem being brought to the notice of our dear Poirot by his secretary Miss Lemon and Poirot assisting Miss Lemon's sister, Mrs. Hubbard, the warden of the hostel. But when the disappearance of items comes to an end with the confession of the "false" kleptomaniac, and in its stead murder takes place and the whole plot is changed, the story begins to go downhill with the monotony of the criminal investigation.



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