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SETTING: The hotel Sans Souci in the small seaside resort of Leahampton, England during World War II.
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SUMMARY: Tommy and Tuppence Beresford were once a star team for the British Intelligence, accidentally discovered after the First World War. With the coming of World War II, the pair find themselves without any work, dying of boredom, until a chance mission gives them the opportunity to hunt down two German spies, only known by the code names "N" and "M."
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FAVORITE QUOTE: "'...The man who said explanations were a mistake was quite right.'" - Chapter 13, pages 188-189.
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If you've been following my blog, you know that I LOVE Agatha Christie novels. I would only read Hercule Poirot's stories for the longest time, but once I exhausted all of them (or at least I think I have), I started on the rest of her novels. Luckily, there are a lot, and I've learned to like her other detectives (of course not as much as Poirot :P). This book is very short, but my free time has also been short, and it took me nearly a month and a half to finally finish it!
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Things I liked about this book:
- Tommy and Tuppence Beresford. They're great together! I do favor Tuppence a little more; she's hilarious and really matter-of-fact about everything.
- The ease of keeping track of each character. There are a lot of characters in this novel, as there should be in any good mystery novel, in my opinion, in order to successfully keep the reader guessing the culprit. The characters in this book are described fully and in a satisfying manner, and if I ever lost track of one of them, it was my own fault.
- Who "N" and "M" are. It actually wasn't much of a surprise, and the reader figures out who N is about 3/4 of the way through the book. But the way that these two characters disguise themselves as harmless Brits on vacation is very creative!
- That the book was written during WWII. It was published in 1941. This point is one that I like about all of Christie's novels. If the plot is during some major historical event, then it's very likely she wrote it as that event was happening. It's pretty cool to think that what she wrote in this novel could very well have been happening in reality at the exact same time she was writing it.
- Morse code via snoring. Won't say more on that, but very clever!
- Betty's fate. It makes for a nice ending :)
- The revelation of "N" and "M." Going back to #3 above, it really wasn't a surprise who those two characters were. I like mystery novels where there's a little more of a *gasp* factor.
Hercule Poirot books are still my absolute favorite, but I did enjoy this novel, and I have put the first Tommy and Tuppence novel written by Christie, The Secret Adversary, on my list! Hopefully with the Christmas holiday rolling around soon, I'll be able to read it in a more timely fashion...
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Recommend? My answer for all of Agatha Christie's novels: YES!
