Poirot Investigates

Poirot Investigates. Agatha Christie. 1924/2011. HarperCollins. 256 pages.

I loved Poirot Investigates. Perhaps because I had low expectations? This was my first experience reading Christie's short stories. And since I'm not generally a fan of short stories, I didn't have great expectations for enjoying these fourteen stories. Each story is narrated by Captain Hastings. And he is a character that I tend to love and adore. I've found that Hercule Poirot needs a little help either from Hastings or Ariadne Oliver to help tame his arrogance. I have definitely come to love Hercule Poirot through the mysteries I've read, but, it was a long road for me. It wasn't instantaneous like it was with Miss Marple.

This collection of short stories was originally published in 1925. So it is "early" Poirot. The short stories in this collection are:

The Adventure of the Western Star
The Tragedy at Marsdon Manor
The Adventure of the Cheap Flat
The Mystery of Hunter's Lodge
The Million Dollar Bond Robbery
The Adventure of the Egyptian Tomb
The Jewel Robbery at the Grand Metropolitan
The Kidnapped Prime Minister
The Disappearance of Mr. Davenheim
The Adventure of the Italian Nobleman
The Case of the Missing Will
The Veiled Lady
The Lost Mine
The Chocolate Box

It's not that any one story is amazing or incredible. That's not why I loved this collection. For me it is all about the relationship between Poirot and Hastings. Their conversations. Their friendship. Seeing these two together. There is just something DELIGHTFUL about spending time in their company. 

© 2012 Becky Laney of Becky's Book Reviews

The Man in the Brown Suit

The Man in the Brown Suit. Agatha Christie. 1924/2012. HarperCollins. 320 pages.

While I'm not sure it's exactly fair to say that this is one of my least favorite Christie novels, I'm tempted to say it anyway. Because I just didn't care for this one. The narration was a bit strange to me. Most of the novel is narrated by a young woman whose father has just died, Anne Beddingfeld. She's left with practically nothing except her good looks and charm. There's just something about her that makes everyone want to take care of her and trust her. She by chance witnesses an accident, and the "doctor" on the scene of the accident puzzles her greatly though it took her a few hours to figure out just why. A little while later (either that day, or the next) a woman's body is discovered in a house. The house was for sale or for rent, and she had dropped by to see it. There are very few reasons why anyone would connect the two cases together, but, our narrator Anne does. And she takes it upon herself to solve this mystery and discover the identity of the "man in the brown suit." This mystery leads her to a ship bound for South Africa. And it's a trip with danger and risk for both on the ship and off, a number of attempts are made on her life. Along the way, she seems to make a new best friend and fall in love. I didn't exactly like the diary chapters provided by Sir Eustace Pedler. I'm not sure how helpful they were in adding to the story, they proved more distracting than anything else, which I think was the point. The ending, however, is what disappoints me most. The statements the narrator makes about the murderer almost infuriate me. 

Read The Man in the Brown Suit

• If you're a big, big, big fan of Agatha Christie and want to read every mystery she wrote
• If you're expectations are low and you're looking for just something--anything--to read to pass the time

© 2012 Becky Laney of Becky's Book Reviews

We

We. Yevgeny Zamyatin. Translated by Mirra Ginsburg. 1921/1972*. HarperCollins. 233 pages.

I shall simply copy, word for word, the proclamation that appeared today in the One State Gazette... 

We is a dystopian novel. I've been wanting to read it for almost as long as I've been blogging.

What did I think of We?

I found the novel interesting but not necessarily comprehensible. I struggled to make sense of this one. (I think I followed about a third of it.) I'm sure I missed much of what was going on simply because I was trying to make sense of this world, this society. Could the problem--for me--be this society's emphasis on math and logic?

The narrator of We is a state mathematician named D-503. (I did figure out that men have a consonant and an odd number; women have a vowel and an even number). Everything is calculated and precise and governed or regulated. Even intimate relationships. D-503 has two registered partners--O-90 and I330. O-90 desperately wants a child, a dream that isn't likely to come true. And I330 is a big, big tease who manipulates men in oh-so-many ways. Perhaps because D-503 cannot understand her at all, cannot predict anything about her, she fascinates him, enslaves him.

So one of D-503's projects is working on the spaceship, Integral. One State has plans to conquer the universe. Perhaps because of what he does, I-330 sees an opportunity to use him to get what she wants...

A human being is like a novel: until the last page you don't know how it will end. Or it wouldn't be worth reading... (162)

Read We

• If you are looking for a literary quality to your science fiction
• If you enjoy a challenge as you read; if you enjoy complexity
• If you are looking to read a science fiction classic
• If you are interested in Russian literature from this time period

*It was first translated into English (according to Wikipedia) in 1924, this translation by Mirra Ginsburg was done in 1972. 

© 2012 Becky Laney of Becky's Book Reviews