Showing posts with label hercule poirot. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hercule poirot. Show all posts

Review: Murder on the Orient Express

Murder on the Orient Express Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This review is also found on Goodreads! :)

Parts tagged with * has major spoilers. If you still want to read it, please do so on Goodreads here. :)
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This is still one of the most clever mysteries I've read. Unique and fresh even as I've only read it now in 2017. I suspect that I would enjoy this book immensely when I read it for the second time. However, I cannot put this on par with The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, which in my view is in a league of its own.

However, one of the things I love about Murder on the Orient Express is how it seemed to be darker and more sinister. I'm attributing it to the fact that the setting was closed and secluded, and also because the weather here in Manila has been dark and gloomy recently--which is always an ideal background for reading mysteries. However, I often found myself confused and unable to recall the passenger names and details; I even mix them up even after finishing the novel. Unfortunately for an easily-distracted reader like me, some of the characters were not given enough particulars to stand out. The characters were mysterious, and this is partly to blame. The amount of secrecy behind each character became a nuisance. (view spoiler)* Another thing I loved about this book is how it showed Poirot's ability to manipulate his suspects into revealing their little truths. His guesses were not absurd and they were always substantiated and shown (unlike some detective stories *coughdeckercough*).

Review: The Mysterious Affair at Styles

The Mysterious Affair at Styles The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This review is also found on Goodreads! :)
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Actual Rating: 3.8 stars
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To be completely honest, I didn't enjoy this book as much as I'd expected. I love mysteries and I love Christie (despite my still-limited knowledge of her works), but this book didn't really took hold of me, unlike And Then There Were None. As full disclosure, aside from the fact that this being penned by Christie, the only other reason I gave this book a try was because it served as an exordium to reading the book that completely changed Christie's career: The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, a book awarded as the best crime novel ever.