The Mystery of the Blue Train
Agatha Christie
Harper. First published 1928.
Set in the Europe of the 'Belle Epoque', this is an unremarkable Hercule Poirot novel. An American millionaire's daughter is murdered on her way to Nice on the Blue Train from London. Poirot just happens to be on the same train and offers to assist the police. Apart from the usual intrigues and laundry list of suspects, there are some elements of international crime, including a criminal master-mind who is also a master of disguise, a couple of mysterious Russian emigres in Paris, and so on. Half-way through the book, I kind of guessed who the murderer was, though the exact solution, which Poirot produces out of his hat, eluded me. This is not a very well constructed novel. There is some interest in noting the class relations depicted, but these are by-the-way, and arise only as a result of having read Piketty and others. Christie's writing itself, of course, is entirely oblivious to any actual politics, being content to borrow cliches and stereotypes from social history. However, I got this book as a kind of reaction to the previous one - 'One False Move'. And I must say, despite being a mediocre Christie, I found more satisfaction in this book than in that.
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