Miss Marple

Review: The Idol House of Astarte

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Cover image of "The Idol House of Astarte" by Agatha Christie

The Idol House of Astarte (Miss Marple short stories), Agatha Christie. Open Road Integrated Media (ISBN: 9781504082297) 2024 (originally published in 1928, 1932).

Summary: Miss Marple solves a murder occurring before witnesses with no obvious assailant and no weapon found.

The Tuesday Night Club was Miss Marple’s idea of entertaining hospitality. Invite a group of guest over to share mysterious occurrences which Miss Marple would attempt to resolve. None were as unusual as the one related by Dr. Pender, the local clergy.

Years before, he was the guest at a weekend party held at the estate of an old college friend, Sir Richard Haydon. The estate is named Silent Grove for a grove of trees leading to a clearing with a summer house Sir Richard has named the Idol House of Astarte. The guests, in addition to Dr. Pender, are Sir Richard’s cousin Elliot, the beautiful Diana Ashley, to whom Sir Richard is attracted, and a Dr. Symonds.

The Idol House intrigues Diana, and she proposes, in effect, an orgy. Dr. Pender, understandably helps nix this idea and instead, they hold a much tamer costume party. During the party, Diana disappears. The guests search for her, passing through the ominous Silent Grove. They find her at the Idol House. She is wearing the dress of a priestess of Astarte. She dances before the house. A spirit seemingly has taken possession of her! She warns others away but Sir Richard approaches, then falls to the ground. Elliot rushes over, finding him dead, stabbed in the heart. But a search yield’s no weapon. And no one was around Sir Richard when he fell.

Then the police investigate, but the death proves a mystery to them. Dr. Pender even believed it may have been supernatural forces at work. But not Miss Marple! She identifies the murderer who, in fact Dr. Pender knew. The murderer subsequently confessed to Dr. Pender shortly before dying.

Christie does all this in a 25 page short story. Christie first published the story in a mystery magazine in 1928. Later, it was part of a collection, The Thirteen Problems, stories told by different members of the Tuesday Night Club. It makes a great standalone as well as a teaser to get one to buy the whole collection!

Review: A Caribbean Mystery

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A Caribbean Mystery (Miss Marple #9), Agatha Christie. New York, Morrow, 2022 (originally published in 1964).

Summary: A Caribbean holiday after an illness is just what the doctor ordered for Miss Marple, who helps solve a string of murders at a resort.

Miss Marple is recovering from an illness and her nephew Raymond sends her on a Caribbean holiday. Little did he realize how rejuvenating it would be as Miss Marple employs her polite nosiness and the insistence that only an elderly spinster can exercise, to solve a string of murders.

It all begins with Major Palgrave’s interminable and repeating stories. He begins to tell her one of a repeat murderer who had remained unapprehended. He was on the point of showing her a picture when he looks up, puts his wallet away and hastily changes the subject. When he is found dead of an apparent stroke the next morning, Miss Marple has her suspicions. It had been noised about that he had high blood pressure and a bottle of medications was found among his effects.

Except in the course of talking with different members of the party staying at the resort, run by a young couple, the Kendals, Victoria, a housemaid, claims not to have previously seen the medicine. That evening, she’s found dead of knife wounds by Molly Kendal, who has been acting more and more erratic, experiencing lapses of memory and agitation, and had been seen carrying a kitchen knife. Tim attributes her agitation to a family history She’s understandably quite upset, having found the murdered girl and even wondering if, in a fit of madness, whether she is the murderer. She is comforted by Miss Marple, who has her doubts.

Miss Marple’s fears are growing. There are other strange events going on, including finding rich old Mr. Raffiel’s assistant Jackson looking through his papers, and later through Molly Kendal’s cosmetics. People aren’t what they seem. The Hillingdon’s, a seeming perfect couple are sleeping separately, while he is caught up in an affair with “Lucky” Dyson, wife of nature lover Greg Dyson Meanwhile, Miss Marple’s suspicions about Palgrave’s death result in his exhumation and a finding that he was poisoned.

There is one more murder yet to occur and one narrowly prevented. It’s a case of a murderer who overlooks a couple of gossipy old women, Miss Marple and Miss Prescott, Canon Prescott’s sister, and the handicapped Mr. Raffiel. Appearing frail, among the “uglies,” they mobilize action at the right time to save a life and capture a murderer!

How can one not love Miss Marple! And how can one not be amazed at Agatha Christie who spins the perfect Caribbean holiday murder mystery, forty-four years after her first mystery in 1920. In this one, she was still at the top of her game as was her main character, a quietly gossipy busybody who knits her way to another crime solved!

Review: The Mirror Crack’d From Side to Side

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The Mirror Crack’d From Side to Side, Agatha Christie (Miss Marple #9). New York: HarperCollins, 2011, originally published 1962.

Summary: A harmless busybody dies of a poisoned drink intended for a famous actress, the beginning of further threats, and murders that follow.

Marina Gregg, a celebrated but temperamental actress and her husband, Jason Rudd have re-habilitated a Victorian mansion once owned by a friend of Miss Marple, Dolly Bantry. They host a reception for distinguished guests and neighbors. Heather Badcock, a local do-gooder and busybody, who earlier had rendered assistance when Miss Marple had fallen by her house, eagerly greets the actress and tells the story of how she had met her years earlier, rising from her sickbed to get the actress’s autograph.

Subsequently she is jostled, spills her drink, and Marina Gregg offers hers. Minutes later Heather Badcock is dead, poisoned by an overdose of a tranquilizer used by everyone connected with the house, it seems. It dawns on both that the poison was meant for Marina. Subsequently, a cup of coffee intended for Marina is laced with arsenic. Then a secretary dies of an atomizer filled with cyanide as does a dress designer. The question is how the killer who is threatening Marina is gaining access.

And Miss Marple? Out of caution for her age, she has an overly-protective live in attendant, who she has to elude. Her doctor thinks she needs to do some “unraveling.” This case allows her that opportunity as her adopted “nephew,” Chief Inspector Craddock, seeks her perspective. As usual, she pays close attention to details–a stained dress and the “help” who saw the accident, the stories in the celebrity gossip magazines and the look on Marina’s face as she talked to Mrs. Badcock, from which the book takes its title, the look on Lady Shalott’s face when she saw the “mirror crack’d from side to side.” What was this look, and what caused it?

This was a delightful read and as always, it is fun to admire Miss Marple’s “spunk.” The ending surprised me, adding to the satisfaction. Side characters like Dolly Bantry, Dr. Haycock, and even Cherry, the housekeeper add to the pleasure. Agatha even sneaks in some commentary on the new “developments” and their lack of personality. No wonder they called Christie “the Queen of Mystery.”

Review: The Affair at the Bungalow

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The Affair at the Bungalow

The Affair at the Bungalow, Agatha Christie. New York: Witness Impulse, 2013 (originally published in the anthology Thirteen Problems in 1932).

Summary: Actress Jane Helier tells a story of a mysterious burglary at a bungalow in the town where she is acting in a play, involving a woman impersonating her and an unfortunate young playwright. Miss Marple, professing to be baffled, privately hints at a different story.

Most readers are familiar with Agatha Christie’s full-length mysteries. This is a delightful short story originally part of an anthology titled Thirteen Problems first published in 1932, and now available in e-book form as a stand-alone short story.

Jane Helier, an actress, is with a party of friends including Miss Marple, and turns the conversation to a mysterious event that happened to a “friend” of hers, who is quickly found out to be Jane herself. She was in a town by a river (“Riverbury”) as part of a play company when called upon by the police to confront a young man arrested for burglary. The story gets more interesting when the young man, a playwright, claims he was summoned to a bungalow, the site of the burglary, by Miss Helier. Of course, when he sees Miss Helier, he realizes the other woman was not her. He had called at the bungalow, was introduced by the maid to “Miss Helier,” had a drink, and woke by the side of the road, only to be arrested for burglary. It seems that a case of jewels owned by the mistress of a wealthy city man has been stolen while the house was empty. The mistress was an actress, herself married.

By then it is obvious that the young playwright, Leslie Faulkener, was innocent of the crime. But who stole the jewels? The actress, the maid? The party weights all the angles of the story, and at the end, even Miss Marple professes to be mystified as to the solution, and their ire is further aroused when Jane Helier herself offers no resolution.

As the party is breaking up Miss Marple whispers in Jane’s ear, leaving her startled. Did Miss Marple know more than she let on, that not all was as it seemed? And what did she mean when she said, “What I do realize is that women must stick together–one should, in an emergency, stand by one’s own sex. I think that’s the moral of the story Miss Helier has told us”? What did Miss Marple whisper in her ear?

The one question, which mystifies Miss Helier herself, also mystified me and that is how did Miss Marple know? The resolution of the mystery hinges on information Miss Helier had not told anyone, including Miss Marple, introducing new characters not known to us. How did she know? Was it the vagueness at points in the story? The fact that Miss Helier herself does not know the ending?

In this case, one has only to read twenty-one pages to discover what is going on. But the story demonstrates Christie’s art–to draw one into a crime puzzle–in this case one without a murder, and finish it with a surprise

 

The Month in Reviews: July 2015

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This has been a month of vacationing, of bookstore crawling, and even a trip to Mexico. So squeezing some reading in has been a bit of a challenge. But I finished a couple longish books and a total of nine this month. I read about walking labyrinths, searching for Sunday, pursuing the road to character, dwelling with God, and heeding the warning, “here be dragons”! I considered C. S. Lewis’s view of God, and that of seven American liberals in the 18th to 20th centuries. Along the way, I even managed a literary stay, as it were, at Bertram’s Hotel. Intrigued? I’ll keep you waiting no longer…

Walking the Labyrinth1. Walking the Labyrinth, Travis Scholl. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2014. The book consists of a series of reflections over the forty days of Lent intermingling thoughts on the gospel of Mark, life, and the daily walking of a labyrinth in the churchyard of a neighborhood church.

At Bertram's Hotel2. At Bertram’s Hotel, Agatha Christie. New York: William Morrow Paperbacks, 2011 (reprint). Bertram’s is a quietly elegant hotel from the Edwardian era that seems utterly respectable from the outside and yet is the center of a nefarious crime syndicate and a murder late in the story that Miss Marple and Chief Inspector (Scotland Yard) Davy attempt to unravel.

Is Your Lord Large Enough3. Is Your Lord Large Enough?, Peter J. Schakel. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2008. This book looks at the contribution Lewis made, particularly through the way his books engage the imagination, to the spiritual formation of Christians, exploring a number of the matters crucial to their growth in Christ.

Searching for Sunday4. Searching for Sunday, Rachel Held Evans. Nashville: Nelson Books, 2015. As the subtitle suggests, this is a narrative of the author’s struggle between loving and leaving the Church, only to find her loved renewed through the sacramental practices that she sees at the heart of the Church’s life.

Here be Dragons5. Here Be Dragons, Sharon Kay Penman. New York, Ballantine Books, 1985. The first of the Welsh Princes Trilogy set in the early 13th century, this book explores the conflict between John, the King of England, and Llewelyn, who sought to unify a divided Wales against the English threat. Their lives are intertwined by the daughter of John, Joanna, who becomes the wife of Llewelyn, finding herself torn between loves for father and husband, then husband and son.

The Religion of Democracy6. The Religion of Democracy, Amy Kittelstrom. New York: Penguin Press, 2015. This book traces the “American Reformation” of Christianity through the lives of seven key figures spanning the late eighteenth to early twentieth century, in which adherence to creed shifted to the dictates of personal judgment and the focus shifted from eternal salvation to ethical conduct reflecting a quest for moral perfection and social benefit.

dwell7. Dwell: Life with God for the World, Barry D. Jones. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2014. A focus on mission and a focus on spiritual formation are often divorced from one another. This book argues for a missional spirituality rooted in the incarnation of Jesus, his dwelling among us to restore broken shalom that is revealed in spiritual practices that herald the vision of the kingdom that is both present and to come.

Why Christian faith8. Why Christian Faith Makes Sense, C. Stephen Evans. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2015. Against the contemporary challenges by the New Atheists, this book explores why the Christian faith makes sense, even though the existence of God may not be proven, through the consideration of both “natural signs” and the self-revelation of God.

The Road to Character9. The Road to Character, David Brooks. New York, Random House, 2015. David Brooks explores the issue of character development through the hard-won pursuit of moral virtue, exemplified in the moral quests of people as diverse as Augustine and Bayard Rustin, Frances Perkins and Dorothy Day.

Best book of the month: David Brooks The Road to Character is my choice for this month’s best book, both for the quality of writing and for the conversation he attempts to provoke with regard to the moral ecology of our country.

Best quote of the month: This from Rachel Held Evans in Searching for Sunday, which is an example of her exquisite writing:

“…Sunday morning sneaks up on us — like dawn, like resurrection, like the sun that rises a ribbon at a time. We expect a trumpet and a triumphant entry, but as always, God surprises us by showing up in ordinary things: in bread, in wine, in water, in words, in sickness, in healing, in death, in a manger of hay, in a mother’s womb, in an empty tomb. Church isn’t some community you join or some place you arrive. Church is what happens when someone taps you on the shoulder and whispers in your ear, Pay attention, this is holy ground, God is here.” (p. 258).

Today begins a week on jury duty. Needless to say, I’ll have some books in my bag along with other work. One I won’t be carrying because it is a thick book but one I’m thoroughly enjoying is Brenda Wineapple’s Ecstatic Nation, a chronicle of the spirit of the times in ante- and post-bellum America. Strikes me as eerily similar to today.

Hope you get some good summer reading in during these last days of summer!

[Links in this post are to the full reviews in Bob on Books. In those reviews, you may find links to publishers websites.]

Review: At Bertram’s Hotel

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At Bertram's HotelAt Bertram’s Hotel, Agatha Christie. New York: William Morrow Paperbacks, 2011 (reprint).

Summary: Bertram’s is a quietly elegant hotel from the Edwardian era that seems utterly respectable from the outside and yet is the center of a nefarious crime syndicate and a murder late in the story that Miss Marple and Chief Inspector (Scotland Yard) Davy attempt to unravel.

As I noted, this is an unusual Agatha Christie story. The murder occurs late and actually is not at the heart of the plot. This change of pace alone caught my attention, just to see what Christie was up to.

The center of the action is Bertram’s Hotel, a throwback to an Edwardian past. There one receives refined, understated service from the helpful attentions of the commissionaire, former military Michael Gorman, to the tea service with exquisite muffins, to Miss Gorringe’s front desk and Mr. Humfries’ efficient management, to the kitchen which serves a proper English breakfast. It has done so since Miss Marple’s childhood and to it she returns for a holiday. It is a place that the well-to-do visiting London come for good service out of the public spotlight.

Yet things are not as reputable as they seem as Miss Marple soon becomes aware. She runs into old friend Selina Hazy who speaks of all the people she sees who appear to be old acquaintances only to turn out to just look like them. She observes the reckless race car driver Ladislaus Malinowski in a public encounter with his love interest, the adventuress Lady Bess Sedgewick. Then there is the heiress Elvira Blake, in fact the estranged daughter of Lady Sedgewick, eluding her guardians to make an overnight trip to Ireland to make enquiries related to her estate and to make rendezvous with love interests including race car driver Malinowski. She becomes the object of Miss Marple’s grave concern.

While all this is occurring there have been a string of jewel heists, bank robberies and a daring robbery of the Irish Mail train that all seem to be the efforts of a mysterious crime syndicate. Chief Inspector Davy has been charged to discover who is behind this. When absent-minded Canon Pennyfather, a guest at Bertram’sm does not return from a trip to Lucerne for a conference, Davy becomes involved in the investigation, and, as he interviews Miss Marple, who witnessed Canon Pennyfather leaving the hotel the night he was supposed to be in Lucerne, he begins to share Miss Marple’s suspicion that things are not as they seem at Bertram’s and that there is a connection between the rash of crimes and this respectable hotel.

The one murder in this story occurs late as Elvira Blake, who has mentioned fears for her life, is apparently shot at and narrowly missed, only to have Michael Gorman come to her aid, and take a bullet in the chest protecting her. Yet all is not as it seems, neither in this instance nor with the cast of characters at Bertram’s and much of the enjoyment of this story comes from seeing how Miss Marple and Chief Inspector Davy team up to piece together this mystery.

Not all of the reviews I’ve seen of this have been favorable, suggesting a plot that is a bit far-fetched. Be that as it may, I enjoyed the change of pace of a story where a murder was not the center of the plot. Like all Christies, it is a page-turner with interesting characters, a memorable place (Bertram’s), and of course, the inimitable Miss Marple! Great for a summer vacation read.