Murder in Mesopotamia - Agatha Christie

I must confess that i am a die hard fan of Agatha Christie ..i have read most of her novels many times over...keep reading them again and again knowing fully well who the culprit is, i enjoy her style of writing, the descriptions about the English village life, the gossip everything...

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

AGATHA CHRISTIE((15 September 1890 - 12 January 1976)

Agatha Christie was born in Torquay(Devon).Having lost her father at a young age, her mother encouraged her to develop an interest in writing.She was encouraged to write short stories by her neighbor Eden Philpotts, upon whose advise and help, she successfully published a book of short stories, which proved to be the start of her hugely successful writing career...

She married Archibald Christie , and later during World War II, worked in a Red cross hospital, which gave her the knowledge about various chemicals and poisons , that proved helpful in her writing...

Agatha Christie wrote her first detective novel,"THE MYSTERIOUS AFFAIR AT STYLES"and introduced HERCULE POIROT the Belgian detective, who appeared in more than 40 books. The last of which was CURTAIN (1975) where Hercule poirot dies.... Later the Christies bought a house and named it 'STYLES after her first novel....

However the marriage ended in a divorce and Agatha Christie later married the archaeologist Max Mallowan. She had met him on her travels in Near East and accompanied him on his excavations of sites in Syria and Iraq....

Later Agatha Christie used these exotic settings in her novels MURDER IN MESOPOTAMIA ,DEATH ON THE NILE and THEY CAME TO BAGHDAD...

Agatha Christie ,Of her marriage to the archaeologist told reporters: "An archaeologist is the best husband any woman can have. The older she gets, the more interested he is in her."...She was 12 years older than him...

Agatha Christie has been called , by the Guinness Book of World Records, among others , The Best-Selling writer of all times and the Best-Selling writer of any kind, along with William Shakespeare....

Agatha Christie died on 12 January 1976, at age 85, from natural causes, at Wallingford in Oxfordshire...

THE BOOK

CAST OF CHARACTERS

Hercule Poirot.
The Ackroyds: Mrs. Cecil, Flora and Roger...
Ursula Bourne(maid), Major Hector Blunt, Colonel Carter
Mrs. Ferrars, Mrs. Richard Folliott, Miss Ganett, Mr. Hammond
Charles Kent, Parker, Captain Ralph Paton, Inspector Denis Raglan, Geoffrey Raymond, Miss Russell
Dr. James and Caroline Sheppard...

I have felt that 'THE MURDER OF ROGER ACKROYD' published in 1926, is easily one of the best books Agatha Christie has ever written...It is one the most famous of her books and had created quite a controversy at the time it was published..

"Every murderer is probably somebody's old friend,"..writes Agatha in one of her books...

This is a vintage Hercule Poirot mystery...
The story begins with the murder of a wealthy widow MRS FERRARS in a small English village..There is the usual amount of suspicion and dreadful gossip...There are rumours that she had murdered her first husband,and that she was being blackmailed , also that her secret lover was ROGER ACKROYD..Everybody in the village noticed that the two got on rather very well together...

The verdict of death being Suicide by an overdose of veronal...the gossip mills are working overtime...

ROGER ACKROYD was a man who knew too much, he knew that the woman he loved was being blackmailed....the evening post would let him know who the blackmailer was...But the next evening ROGER ACKROYD, a wealthy widower ,is found murdered in his house, dead before he could read the mail completely.....The two deaths seem connected...

The story is in the form of a narrative by DOCTOR SHEPPARD , the country physician, a friend of both Mrs Ferrars and Roger Ackroyd..

There are many suspects , most prominently young MR.RALPH PATON , the adopted son of Roger Ackroyd...Then there is CECIL
ACKROYD, Roger's widowed sister in law and FLORA, her daughter, who is romantically involved with Ralph....

Flora and Ralph intended to marry , but now with suspicion turned on him, young Flora asks HERCULE POIROT to help her ..
Hercule Poirot, retired and living in a nearby village growing marrows, immediately sets to work...
He begins by sorting through various clues like a chair out of place, a telephone call , and a ring among others...

It proves a difficult case for Hercule poirot but his precise deductions lead to blackmail, murder, and a surprising conclusion.

There are some comic interludes ...like when Poirot unexpectedly drops in at Dr Sheppards place at dinner time... ,and the 'The little MAH JONG party at Dr Sheppards'....the conversation keeps you in splits...

The ending is stunning and totally unexpected..
I enjoyed reading every page of this book...it is a must read for all thriller lovers..

All in all this is an ingenious murder mystery. The facts were all there but who would have guessed??

This is one book where i couldn't help feeling sad at the outcome. Murderer or not, I liked the character very much and felt pretty low when the person was exposed...totally unexpected and shocking

Summary: A must read whodunnit...