Review of Three Act Tragedy

Book #30. Three Act Tragedy, by Agatha Christie. Unabridged audio.

My mother was a big reader, and in particular a fan of mysteries. Every few weeks, she would take a stack back to the library, and return with a new stack from the library. And of course Agatha Christie was strongly represented in those novels that hung around the house.

But I only read a few of them, and the ones I did read were in the Miss Marple series. It wasn’t until recently that I read anything featuring Hercule Poirot. And I have found the adventures of the Belgium detective entertaining and enjoyable.

In this mystery, a man dies after sipping a cocktail at a dinner party thrown by a theatre actor. Guests at the party include Poirot’s friend Mr. Satterthwaite. Another death at a similar party with many of the same guests finally gets Poirot involved. It is revealed that both deaths were caused by nicotine poison. With the help of the stage actor, Poirot is able to put his little grey cells to work to uncover the identity of the killer.

This was an interesting story, as Poirot was absent for long parts of it. This enabled the other characters to develop, making me care more about the victims and potential killers. I enjoyed this “take” on the common mystery story.

Source: public library