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You would be hard put to find a mystery fiction fan who hasn't read Agatha Christie, the self-styled "Duchess of Death" and author of a host of whodunits, including The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, the Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple books, and Death on the Nile - inspiration for the excellent film
of the same name starring Peter Ustinov, Maggie Smith, David Niven, and Bette Davis.

In her long career as novelist and playwright, Christie wrote some 80 novels and even today - decades years after her death - her books continue to sell in the millions of copies each year.

Born in 1890 in Torquay, Devon, England, she was tutored at home by her mother until, in her teens, she was dispatched to Paris to study music. She married twice - in 1914 to Archibald Christie, an officer in the Royal Air Corps and - after divorcing the unfaithful Christie - in 1930 to archaeologist Max Edgar Lucien Mallowan.

Christie served as a volunteer nurse during World War I, a position that is believed to have given her the knowledge of drugs and poisons useful to a mystery writer. Similarly, accompanying her second husband, the archaeologist, on digs in the Middle East aided her in writing books like Death on the Nile.

Interesting personal tidbits about Christie: She never wrote a mystery in which both of her most famous detectives (Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot) appeared, possibly because she didn't think they would like each other. She had an unsolved mystery in her own life. In 1926 she disappeared for eleven days and her disappearance resulted in a large manhunt. When she eventually reappeared, it was speculated that she had attempted to fake her own death in order to implicate her cheating husband. She claimed amnesia for the event.

If you like Agatha Christie, other authors you may want to explore are Dorothy L. Sayers, Margery Allingham, Ngaio Marsh, and P. D. James.

Only two Christie mysteries are in the public domain and available for free download to the Kindle: The Mysterious Affair at Styles, which marked the first appearance of Christie's famous detective Hercule Poirot, and The Secret Adversary, which chronicles the first case of young-adventurers-for-hire Tommy and Tuppence.

A SELECTION OF CHRISTIE MYSTERIES FOR THE KINDLE:

Murder on the Orient Express. HarperCollins. Kindle edition $4.79.
"Just after midnight, a snowstorm stops the Orient Express dead in its tracks in the middle of Yugoslavia. The luxurious train is surprisingly full for this time of year. But by morning there is one passenger less. A 'respectable American gentleman' lies dead in his compartment, stabbed a dozen times, his door locked from the inside - Hercule Poirot is also aboard, having arrived in the nick of time to claim a second-class compartment - and the most astounding case of his illustrious career." - Amazon.

Death on the Nile. HarperCollins. $4.79.
"Hercule Poirot is perhaps Agatha Christie's most interesting and endearing character; short, round, and slightly comical, Poirot has a razor-sharp mind and puts unlimited trust in his 'little grey cells.' Those little cells come through for him every time, enabling Poirot to solve some of the most baffling mysteries ever conceived. In Death on the Nile, Poirot, on vacation in Africa, meets the rich, beautiful Linnet Doyle and her new husband, Simon. As usual, all is not as it seems between the newlyweds, and when Linnet is found murdered, Poirot must sort through a boatload of suspects to find the killer before he (or she) strikes again." - Amazon.

The Body in the Library. HarperCollins. Kindle edition $4.79.
"The very-respectable Colonel and Mrs Bantry have awakened to discover the body of a young woman in their library. She is wearing evening dress and heavy make-up, which is now smeared across her cold cheeks. But who is she? How did she get there? And what is her connection with another dead girl, whose charred remains are later discovered in an abandoned quarry? The Bantrys turn to Miss Marple to solve the mystery." - Amazon.

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd. HarperCollins. Kindle edition $4.79.
"In the quiet village of King's Abbot a widow's suicide has stirred suspicion - and dreadful gossip. There are rumours that she murdered her first husband, that she was being blackmailed, and that her secret lover was Roger Ackroyd. Then, on the verge of discovering the blackmailer's identity, Ackroyd himself is murdered. Hercule Poirot, who has settled in King's Abbot for some peace and quiet and a little gardening, finds himself at the centre of the case - and up against a diabolically clever and devious killer." - Amazon.

And Then There Were None. HarperCollins. $4.79.
"Considered the best mystery novel ever written by many readers, And Then There Were None is the story of 10 strangers, each lured to Indian Island by a mysterious host. Once his guests have arrived, the host accuses each person of murder. Unable to leave the island, the guests begin to share their darkest secrets - until they begin to die." - Amazon.

RELATED WEB RESOURCES:

Amazon's Agatha Christie page.

What's Your Favorite Agatha Christie? - discussion on MobileRead.

Agatha Christie websites recommended in the Librarians' Internet Index.


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