CLAIRE LADDS

Author of character-driven psychological literary fiction and other darker books, all with an emotional pull

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Read Christie 2021: my April book choice – The Seven Dials Mystery

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Read Christie 2021 April: The Seven Dials Mystery

This month I have chosen to read The Seven Dials Mystery as part of the Read Christie 2021 challenge. The remit for this month was to read a story which was written before World War II. There are a number to choose from but I chose The Seven Dials Mystery because I haven’t read this book for decades. I have to say that I absolutely loved revisiting it and read it in one day, which is something I hardly every do!

This is very much a ‘young person’s adventure’ plot and also sees Christie returning to some of the characters who had their first adventure in The Secret of Chimneys. If you have read Chimneys, and recognise the mansion, you’ll probably also recognise the name of Lady Eileen Brent, commonly known as Bundle, who lives at Chimneys with her father and is irrepressible in her pursuit of the truth.

This time, Bundle and her father come back from a holiday abroad to find that a man belonging to a party of people who were renting Chimneys has died in one of their bedrooms. It certainly makes Bundle’s father give second thoughts to renting out their home while they are away in future!

It doesn’t take long for Bundle and her adventurous friends to decide that this man was murdered. The situation becomes graver when another friend dies, his last words being the mysterious ‘seven dials’.

This phrase takes Bundle and her crime-busting friends to Soho, and the discovery of masked members of The Seven Dials Society, who meet in a secret room. Who are they, and what are they planning? And were they responsible for the killings?

This book also reintroduces Superintendent Battle, who occurs in several Christie novels as the presiding investigating officer. Battle is a large man but with a very astute, softly-softly approach to getting things done. Battle acts as an enabler to Bundle’s wish to act as sleuth by giving her permission to do so, and often both of them are present as events pile up and things get most and more mysterious – and dangerous. But Bundle proves herself extremely capable of figuring out what’s been going on, surprising Battle on more than one occasion with her capabilities.

This is very much a relatively fast-moving adventure with plenty of intrigue, secrets and shenanigans. There are also some very wry twists in the plot that couldn’t help but make me smile. So much of this story is like real life in that whatever we see and believe is based on what we expect to be the case and on our preconceptions about people.

If you love Christie’s light-hearted adventure mystery novels then I think you’ll enjoy this one. Next month’s Read Christie book has to be one which features tea. I’m going to return to my favourite of Christie’s sleuths – Poirot – in After the Funeral.

Read Christie 2021: my March book choice – Death in the Clouds

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I am back once more with my #ReadChristie2021 challenge choice, this time for March. This one was under threat all month due to my fingers being slavishly glued to the keyboard in an attempt to complete the first draft of my next book by the end of the month. Somehow, though, I’ve managed to squeeze in my reading through some matchstick-propping of eyelids. 🙂

The remit for this month was a book containing a society figure. The recommended read was Lord Edgware Dies, but I chose to read a story that I haven’t read since I was about fourteen. I picked Death in the Clouds, partly to see how much of the original story I remembered, and partly to see how it differed from the film version starring David Suchet as Poirot.

#ReadChristie2021 my March read

The setup for the story is as follows: After a visit to France, Poirot and others, some who have been to watch the tennis, some who had other reasons to be there, head to England on a plane. Poirot is among a small group of passengers in the first class compartment but, as he hates flying, he wraps himself up and tries to block out the trip altogether. As they approach the end of the flight, one of the stewards discovers one of the passengers is dead. At first glance, it appears she has been stung by a wasp, but on closer examination, it’s blatantly clear that a poisoned dart has stabbed her in the neck and a blowpipe is discovered in the back of one of the chairs, right near where Poirot had been sitting. And poor Poirot isn’t trusted, then, by most of his fellow passengers or by certain members of the authorities.

It turns out that the dead woman is a notorious money-lender, publicly known as Madame Giselle, and who targeted people with secrets which she could hold over them in order to ensure repayment of their loans. One of the passengers in that first-class compartment must have killed her somehow, even though it seems impossible that anyone could have blown a dart at the woman without being seen. But someone did, and there are a number of distinctly likely candidates. Poirot is determined to help Inspector Japp solve the case – if only to reclaim his respectability!

The trail leads them back to France to discover the secrets of Madame Giselle – including any information they can find out about the secret daughter who inherits everything. Back in England, and with the aid of two of the younger passengers, Jane grey, a hairdresser, and Norman Gale, a dentist, (and who form the beginnings of a romantic attachment as a nice little sideline) the plot gradually unfolds, despite the many attempts to misdirect and misinform Poirot, until the culprit is revealed.

So, where does the society figure come it, then? Well, of course, she is one of the suspects. Lady Horbury is an addicted gambler – and she’s also addicted in other ways, too. She really is one of those characters who make me ‘bristle’. I struggle to find anything at all in the way of a redeeming feature. And she is, as you can well imagine, a strong suspect. Whether she did a very clever job on the woman to whom she was in debt and who knew way more about her than she wanted leaking to the press or other members of her society circle, I shall not tell you – obviously!

I’m going to be honest and say that this is not one of my favourite Christie stories, but as ever with books, this is just my subjective opinion. I do, however, think that the plot device used to enable the perpetrator of the crime to do their dastardly deed was very clever. It is one Christie used several times, for example in the short story ‘The yellow iris’, which she extended and which also became the novel Sparkling Cyanide. If you’ve read them, you’ll know what I’m talking about. If not, I’m not going to spoil it for you!

As ever when I use affiliate links I let you know. Links in this post will take you to Amazon.com. I may earn a tiny commission if you choose to purchase through my link, at no extra cost to you (if you shop on Amazon US, that is).

Have you decided to join in the Read Christie challenge this year? If you have, I’d love to hear about what you’ve been reading. If not, I’d still love to hear about what you’ve been reading – I’m always happy to add to my ‘to be read’ pile! Feel free to add your recommendations in the comments.

Happy reading!

Spell the Month in Books: March

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<!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>I have five crime-filled stories to share with you in my Spell the Month in Books post for March. This time they span the centuries in their settings, from the medieval to the twentieth century.

I have five crime-filled stories to share with you in my Spell the Month in Books post for March. This time they span the centuries in their settings, from the medieval to the twentieth century. The books I have chosen this time around are:

Mistress of the Art of Death – Ariana Franklin

Alienist The) – Caleb Carr

Remorseful Day (The) – Colin Dexter

Coroner’s Pidgin – Margery Allingham

Holy Disorders – Edmund Crispin

Every one of these is available in audiobook, so I’ve linked to that version, although available ebooks, paperbacks and hardcovers are all listed as well.

We begin with the Middle Ages. Children have disappeared and one murdered in Cambridge. Blame is placed on the Jews who go into hiding, much to the displeasure of the king, who relies on them for revenue. In desperation, he enlists Simon of Naples to help him, and he brings with him Ariana Aguila. She has a secret for fear of being accused of witchcraft – her skill in the study of corpses. In the course of her investigations, it becomes clear that the killer has noticed her involvement. Will the killer strike again – and this time, at her?

I picked up this book originally because of my love of the Cadfael mysteries. And I am so pleased I did! It’s a very long book at just over 500 pages (or a long listen if in audio!) and wonderfully easy to read and become absorbed in. No confusing medieval dialogue to negotiate, which I appreciate, even after studying medieval literature! I have to say that I became very attached to the character of Ariana, and am really looking forward to getting around to reading the next book in the series.

Fast forward a few centuries to the Victorian period, and the setting for the quite simply stunning story of The Alienist. This is another whopping book, the story coming in at 531 pages in my version, but it’s worth every bit of your time – and if you’ve seen the series adapted from the book, you’ll know exactly what I mean. The book is written from the viewpoint of crime reporter, John Schuyler Moore, who tells the story of the solving of a set of hideous crimes.

The book is set in 1896. In New York, corruption and hypocrisy are everywhere, and someone is violently murdering young boy prostitutes. Theodore Roosevelt, Police Commissioner has to do something and he is prepared to try anything, including putting faith in psychologist (the alienist) Dr Lazlo Kreizler and John Schyler Moore to use the forensic and psychological work which is still in its infancy. There is an epitome of evil out there. They have to delve deep into the darkness of the human psyche and catch this killer, because he just keeps killing… I was spellbound by this book, and equally the series. If you love dark Victorian crime and drama, I can’t recommend this story highly enough.

Now we have three books all from the twentieth century, beginning with the most modern in this month’s stack, (The) Remorseful Day. It seems to be becoming a habit for me to pick a Colin Dexter novel and cheat a bit with the title by bracketing off the ‘the’! The wonderful Inspector Morse appears in his last crime-solving exploit. The murder of Yvonne Harrison still hasn’t been solved after a year, and Morse refuses to take on the case. So what is it that’s prompting him to make investigations of his own, as his health deteriorates? Things are not quite right, and Sergeant Lewis knows it.

If you have read (or indeed, watched) The Remorseful Day, then I have no need to tell you what a poignant book this turns out to be. If you haven’t, then I would recommend that you read the other Morse books first. I have no words to describe my emotions when reading this book, except that, for a man endlessly troubled with affairs of the heart, this last Morse book by Colin Dexter felt, to me, a very fitting ending to the series.

Coroner’s Pidgin is a book of a very different temperament to The Remorseful Day. Albert Campion is in his bath, after coming back from his holidays. Instead of relaxing, he ends up on the trail of a murderer, when his servant, Lugg comes home with a dead woman in his arms. This was the first book I ever read of Margery Allingham’s Albert Campion crime-solving antics.

While Campion is a nice enough character (although you may find in some of the books his patriarchal and sexist views, especially towards his sister, to be a bit much for you), I have developed a very soft spot for Lugg. He’s a great sidekick, and thoroughly enjoyable to watch in his split role of underground thug and honourable butler. This book has an Audible-only audiobook, so if you’re interested in listening to this one, you can take a look here.

Finally, the delightfully lighthearted mystery, Holy Disorders. I think the series of Gervase Fen stories are perfect if you’re looking for a mystery with a quirky and lighthearted narrative. Gervase Fen is an Oxford don who just seems to constantly land himself in trouble. This time, he has gone toddling off to Tolnbridge where he is busying himself with catching butterflies. And, of course, while he’s there, the most placid an inoffensive organist in the world ends up murdered. So begins Gervase’s detective work in Tolnbridge – and there are some very oddball theories thrown up as he goes about his sleuthing!

I’ve not read very many of Edmund Crispin’s books, but the ones I have read remind be very much of the feeling I got when reading P.G. Wodehouse’s Jeeves and Wooster stories. The Gervase Fen mysteries are not as obviously comedic as Wodehouse; the amusement is more subtle, but if you find you develop a liking for his quirkiness, then this could be a series for you.

There’s such a wide variety of times and settings in my February Spell the Month in Books bookstack that hopefully you might find something in a historical timeframe you enjoy, or you might be tempted to try a new historical period for your crime and mystery reads. My favourite period will always be the interwar (1920s-30s), but it’s extremely close contender is the Victorian era. What’s yours? I’d love to hear, if you’d like to leave your favourites in the comments.

As always, so you know, any Amazon affiliate links I have used in this post may earn me a tiny commission if you are able to buy through any of them (and these are all US affiliate links only). However, I only ever link to a book or product that I’ve used and thoroughly enjoyed myself, so you only ever get wholehearted, genuine recommendations from me.

Happy reading!

Read Christie 2021: my February book choice – Sad Cypress

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The Read Christie 2021 challenge for February was to read a book featuring love. I knew immediately which one I was going to read. Sad Cypress is a novel I read when I was in my early teens and it has truly stuck with me for decades. I can vividly remember where I was, the weather, the seat I was on (in case you’re wondering, it was a sun bed in the back garden), and exactly how I felt when I devoured this book the first time. It, I believe, was completely responsible for my lifelong wish to write books containing poisons (which I did manage to achieve in Baby up the Chimney). Anyway, back to Sad Cypress.

Plot

Elinor Carlisle stands in the dock, accused of murdering Mary Gerrard. Elinor was in line to inherit the estate of her aunt, Mrs Welman, but after an anonymous letter, it seems that Mary Gerrard might have been getting a bit too close to Mrs Welman for some people’s liking. To make matters worse, Elinor’s boyfriend’s sudden love for Mary causes the engagement to be broken off. Meanwhile, Mary, encouraged by the local nurse, nurse Hopkins, has made a will, and now it seems she has something to leave to its recipient. Elinor, too, has made a will, leaving everything she inherits to Roddy, the ex boyfriend.

While clearing out the house and the lodge, Elinor makes sandwiches, and invites Mary and nurse Hopkins who has taken a shine to Mary and is helping out, to have lunch with her. An hour later, Mary is dead.

So, did Elinor poison Mary Gerrard with Morphine in the sandwiches, like the police think she did? Or has someone got it in for Elinor and is framing her for the murder? The local doctor is determined to get Elinor off at all costs, and enlists the help of Hercule Poirot to do so. And Poirot searches for the truth, even if that means he discovers that Elinor is guilty of murder after all.

Okay, so there’s much more to the plot than that, but I really don’t want to give you any spoilers. Onto the book itself…

One of the first things I noticed – and loved – about this book is its cyclic structure. I almost always flick through a Christie book before I start reading (I have no idea why, because I’ve inadvertently ruined the end of a few of them by doing it. I don’t necessarily recommend doing it!). In so doing with this one, though, I discovered the very interesting mechanics of this story. It is set out in three parts and includes what I would certainly describe as a prologue.

The book opens with the court case of the suspect, Elinor Carlisle, on trial, and this part is seen from her perspective. There are enough indicators in this very short section to intrigue a Christie fan and give her ample motive for murder. I became totally hooked on the character of Elinor. I’m not at all sure she’s meant to come across as particularly likeable, but she endeared herself to me, and that’s good enough for this reader!

The book is then split into three parts: the first depicts the events leading up to the murder, from the viewpoints of the characters who are all in and around the house at the time. We, therefore, get a good opportunity to find out about these characters and, in some cases, discover what is going on inside their heads and this becomes very important as we, as readers, are swayed this way and that as the book progresses. This particularly is relevant to Elinor, Mary, and the boyfriend, Roderick (Roddy). For me, I felt that my feelings were adroitly manipulated back and forth by Christie over who I felt sympathy with, but I still kept coming back to Elinor.

The second part gives us Poirot, who takes on the case at the request of Doctor Peter Lorde, and sets about interrogating the major and minor players, and typically noticing the tiny details which make all the difference to the case against Elinor Carlisle. This really is the part where Poirot fans can enjoy watching his wonderful brain at work. The clues are all there, in the detail, if only you know what you’re looking for! It’s very worthwhile paying close attention to what people say, as well as what they do.

In the final section, we return to where we started. The third section revolves almost exclusively around the court case. For anyone who loves the intricacies of the to-ing and fro-ing of arguments put forward by barristers, then this is brilliant, and I was fascinated. The ending itself, for me, was both a suitable and realistic solution to the personal issues all the characters have faced throughout, and it highlights Poirot’s astute grasp of the human heart.

If you have watched the TV film version of Sad Cypress, you will notice some differences on reading the novel. The characters’ actions are developed in such a way as to give us a definite and directed indication as to how we are meant to feel about the main characters. For me, the film gives the love triangle a contemporary dimension, altering the actions of Roddy and Mary just enough to bring about a level of overt sexual tension not quite found in the book. The film has also developed some of the scenes, particularly those that occur in letter-writing format, to bring things more inside the main house and the lodge in the grounds, too. Very handy for filmic reasons, I am sure. This, notably, includes the build up to the ending and the final discovery of the culprit. In the book, this all happens in court and very little of it involves Poirot directly. So, as far as the film goes, I’m glad the court case was substituted with other scenes – or we might not have seen much of David Suchet as Poirot at all!

I have absolutely no hesitation at all in recommending this book to anyone who wants to read a Christie mystery that is not just a very clever whodunnit with well-planted clues, but that gets inside the main character’s head in a way that wrings out your insides, and that has a really interesting play on structure.

And my March book choice? It has to be a book involving a society figure. Well, there are a number to choose from, including Death on the Nile, Lord Edgware Dies and Sparkling Cyanide. But for my choice next month, I’ve gone for Death in the Clouds. More on that in a few weeks. If you’re participating in #ReadChristie2021, I’d love to hear from you, and to know what you’ve been reading – and what you’re planning on reading. It took me ages to plan out my choices because I want to read ‘all the things’. 🙂

Whatever you’re reading, I hope you’re loving it!

Spell the Month in Books: February

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Here I am again with my spell the Month in Books choices! This time, I’m looking at a bookstack of crime and mystery stories which I have on my shelves and which contain a whole host of fantastic characters, whether detective/sleuth or criminal.

Here’s my list of books:

Fear in the Sunlight – Nicola Upson

Except the Dying – Maureen Jennings

Brat Farrar – Josephine Tey

Raffles – E.W. Hornung

Unnatural Habits – Kerry Greenwood

And then There Were None – Agatha Christie

Riddle of the Third Mile (The) – Colin Dexter

You Let Me In – Lucy Clarke

Fear in the Sunlight is one of Nicola Upson’s wonderful mysteries set between the wars and featuring the writer, Josephine Tey, as the sleuth. While Josephine is on holiday in Portmeiron to celebrate a friend’s fortieth birthday and to sign a film deal with Alfred Hitchcock for a novel she’s written, one of the group becomes the unfortunate object of a brutal and gruesome murder. The next day, it happens to another one of the party. Is there a serial killer on the loose? Josephine joins forces with Chief Inspector Penrose to find out as suspicion grows rife among the remaining guests and they fear for their lives.

The fantastic Victorian detective William Murdoch appears in Except the Dying. It is 1895, and the body of a pregnant girl is discovered in a freezing cold street in Toronto. Murdoch soon begins to think that her murder may well be an attempt to disguise the knowledge that she had been embroiled with a man belonging to one of the affluent families in the city. I find Murdoch such an endearing character, and I love his quirkiness, his inventiveness and his relationships with the other characters. As someone who has watched all of the Murdoch Mysteries episodes (many times!), it’s very difficult not to envisage Yannick Bisson as the Murdoch of the book. I don’t have a problem with that in the slightest…!

Josephine Tey’s Brat Farrar gives the writer another mention in this particular bookstack, although this time, as the non-fictional version! I’m going to be honest and say that, although I’ve owned Brat Farrar quite a while, I’ve not yet read it. But I must! A man has been coached on every possible detail of the supposedly dead Patrick Ashby, who died at the age of thirteen, in order to claim his inheritance. But dark secrets emerge that threaten both Brat Farrar’s plan and his life, the longer he continues his deception.

Raffles is one in my bookstack which most certainly is not a sleuth-style crime book! In fact, it is quite the opposite, and is the first in a series of witty stories exploring the world of crime from the viewpoint of the thieves. In this first story, Raffles: The Amateur Crackman, Raffles’ schoolboy friend, Bunny Manders, enlists his help to get him out of gambling debt which has mounted up so badly that he almost shoots himself directly in front of Raffles. And so begin the adventures – starting with a daring robbery of a jewellers. This should keep Bunny out of trouble now, surely?

I really love Kerry Greenwood’s lady detective, Phryne Fisher, and Unnatural Habits sees Phryne and her maid-come-sidekick, Dot, getting involved in a series of disappearances. The victims all have something in common: they are blonde-haired girls, and three of the are definitely pregnant. They also all have one other connection – they work at the Magdalene Laundry. An intrepid female journalist is also on the case, and it’s not too long before she also goes missing. Phryne needs to do something about this before any more girls vanish without trace. What I always find thoroughly endearing about Phryne is her capability of using everything within her power – her wealth and position, certainly, but also her femininity and her empathy and understanding with all women and girls placed in dreadful situations, because there is so much more to this lady detective than beautiful clothes and a privileged lifestyle.

My all-time favourite crime writer once again appears in my bookstack. Agatha Christie wrote a number of standalone crime stories, some thriller, some with a dark Gothic feel or occult element, and some incredible mysteries. And Then There Were None, I think, combines all of these, and it is one of my absolute favourites of the standalones. Ten strangers are ‘invited’ to a house on an isolated island in Devon by the mysterious U.N. Owen. During their first dinner together, a record containing the voice of the mysterious host begins to accuse each of the guests of hiding a terrible secret and, before the end of the evening, one of the guests ends up dead. It doesn’t take long for the remaining guests to realise that the killer must be on the island, and worse, that it is one of them – and whoever it is is going to kill again and again…

Ah, now, Inspector Morse. I’ve never come across a Morse book or episode that I didn’t like. I might have cheated (just a tiny bit) by ignoring ‘the’ in the title, but the book itself hopefully makes up for it. As usual, this book sees the detective display his usual contempt for the dons of Oxford, as the torso of one of them, Browne-Smith (or at least Morse believes it could be) is fished out of the Oxford canal. Browne-Smith has disappeared and it appears that an event that happened in World War II may be the motive for the murder, but is it really? And is the dismembered body actually Browne-Smith or another victim entirely? There are suspects galore, and endless twists and turns to this one. Riddle of the Third Mile is definitely one to read for its complexity and if you love a plot to throw you in every possible direction.

I failed in my last letter, as I had to repeat last month’s book! Who would have thought it was so difficult for me to find a crime book beginning with ‘y’ on my bookcases?! So here we are again with You Let Me In. Briefly, as I described the book last month, I can tell you that Elle has felt very strange since renting out her house. Then she starts to receive threats which suggest that the person who is in her house now knows about her past – and what she did. What exactly do they know, and what are they going to do about it? And why is her imagination hearing footsteps, seeing shadows? It is in her imagination, isn’t it?

I hope that you might be inspired to read some of the books in my February bookstack. If I was going to point you to one in particular, if you’ve never read it, then be sure to read And Then There Were None. There is also an absolutely amazing three-part adaptation of the book on Amazon Prime Video, which I didn’t bother renting but bought outright and have watched countless times (Charles Dance and Sam Neill star, so what’s not to love?!). I thought it was fantastic and exceptionally well done. I will definitely be writing more on this story, and in detail on the adaptation of this, and many other Christie stories, in the coming weeks.

Doing this is also showing me that I really do need to read more of my Josephine Tey collection, and get around to curling up with Lucy Clarke’s book. Although I’m not sure that I’m going to feel very warm and cosy once I get going. I think I might be checking my door..! Sounds thrilling. 🙂

Happy reading!

Read Christie 2021: my January book choice – Crooked House

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I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that I was participating in the #ReadChristie2021 challenge, and as well as telling you what the official Agatha Christie team have chosen for their January read (The Hollow), I said that I had opted to read something different.

January’s challenge is to read a Christie book set in a grand house. Instead of The Hollow, I chose Crooked House, a book that I first read when I was about sixteen, and which I have recently watched on TV – in fact, this probably prompted my choice because I wanted to compare the original with the adaptation.

Plot

The Leonides family live together in a huge house on the edge of London. They had no idea that one of them could be capable of murder until Aristide Leonides, head of the household, was found poisoned.

Leonides had a regular injection of insulin which the murderer had substituted for eserine. Was the murderer a bit stupid? Whoever it was had not even removed the incriminating evidence. Or was there something much more sinister, much more evil at work here?

Charles Hayward is the son of the Assistant Commissioner of Scotland Yard. He also is about to marry one of the household, Sophia Leonides. Solving this murder therefore becomes his priority and he sets about tracking down the culprit. But will the murderer strike again and, if so, who could possibly be next on the list – and why?

Of the standalone novels, it, for me, stands out as one of the best. It certainly didn’t fail me on that score when re-reading it this month. It has all the hallmarks of classic Golden Age mystery – the amateur sleuth, a tight cast of characters in a closed setting, in this case the English Country House, and one hell of a puzzle to solve. And in this case, it has the added impetus of making the reader seriously question their detecting beliefs, and what they actually want to believe. It is truly incredible (and I mean that in as many ways as you wish to take it).

I think of it often as I’m scanning my Christie bookshelves as one of the stories that really packed a punch for me because it left me truly shocked. No spoilers here, but if you’ve never read Crooked House, I thoroughly recommend it.

I would love to know if you decided to take up the Read Christie 2021 challenge, and if you did, what you decided to read for January and what you thought about your choice. Have you read Crooked House previously and, if so, what did you think of it (try to avoid spoilers in your comments, or mark them clearly beforehand, please, so others who don’t know the story can choose to skip over them).

Happy reading!