Working my way through the boxes (part 2)
Sep. 12th, 2010 09:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hnpccContinuing my way through the Christie novels:
4. The Clocks.
First published 1963.
Brief plot set up: A typist turns up for a scheduled appointment at a house in a confusingly laid out suburb and finds a dead man (who hadn't made the appointment). Oh and four new clocks on the mantlepiece above the body, which is where the title comes in. The police, a member of the British Secret Service and Hercule Poirot investigate. The investigations become more urgent when another body turns up.
People: The 1920s adenoidal housemaid has mutated into an adenoidal typist, the Secret Service man is the son of one of her previous detectives, the new detective is competent. Hercule Poirot must be in his 80s or 90s by now - he barely stirs from his flat but investigates by remote, using the two men as proxies. Also there's the trendy young typist who found the body, a blind woman whose house the body was found in, people defecting to Russia (you were wondering how the Secret Service got involved, right?), a martinet running the typing agency and some other suburban residents.
Culture clashes: Typewriters! Phone boxes! Typists! People hiring typists to type handwritten manuscripts (including one hysterical excerpt from a romance novel) and take dictation!
Overall: Poirot aging made me sad, he's not really in the story much. The twists weren't bad, I was curious to see how she'd get the various threads to hang together but they did in the end.
5. Elephants can remember.
First published 1972.
Brief plot set up: Ariadne Oliver (a.k.a. "Mary-Sue Christie") is buttonholed at a literary lunch by a Large Formidable Woman, who demands that she investigate the deaths of her potential daughter-in-law's parents, for eugenic reasons ("did her father murder her mother or the other way around?") Despite initial hesitations Mrs Oliver does just that (after consulting with the daughter-in-law, who is her god-daughter). She calls on the aid of her friend Hercule Poirot to help.
People: Poroit is still mostly housebound, but more active. Mrs Oliver is initially irritating but gets less so as the book progresses. The Large Formidable Woman remains Large and Formidable. The god-daughter, the son, the parents, the mother's sister and various ex-servants and ex-colonial friends of the parents make appearances. Well in the memories of other people in the case of the parents!
Culture clashes: OK, Agatha, how old were you by this point again? The mother was thirty-five when she died. 35 is Not Old, nor "past her prime". Even if she was married to a 65 year old - I seriously wondered if she was supposed to have been 45 and there was a typo. Although I did get a laugh out of the dissing of late 60s/early 70s wedding fashions: "I don't think weddings are nearly as pretty as they used to be in our day. Some of them seem to wear such very peculiar clothes. The other day one of my friends went to a wedding and she said the bridegroom was dressed in some sort of quilted white satin and ruffles at his neck. Made of Valenciennes lace, I believe. Most peculiar. And the girl was wearing a very peculiar trouser suit. Also white but it was stamped with green shamrocks all over." Why do I have the distinct feeling that this was from life?
Overall: Well I guessed the solution from about half way through the book - a little bit too obvious, particularly once they mentioned a certain relationship - but I enjoyed the ride. Although not the increasingly tortured "Elephants" metaphor - people remember things. Yeah, we know and elephants don't forget. You've told us what, several thousand times?
6. Ordeal by Innocence.
First published 1958.
Brief plot set up: A doctor arrives to tell a family that the son who was convicted of his mother's murder was, in fact, innocent. (Pity he died of pneumonia in gaol then.) This of course only leaves one problem - if he didn't do it, who in the family did?
People: Previously hen-pecked patriarch, now on the verge of re-marriage to his former secretary. Swedish former masseuse, who had lived with the family since world war two. Oldest, emotionally aloof daughter, married to a former fighter pilot who since contracted polio and is wheelchair bound. Extremely Angry Son, who is still rebelling against his mother. Quiet, shy daughter. Extraordinarily mercurial and possibly developing some form of mental illness daughter. And a solid English Detective and Very Dry Lawyer to round them out.
Culture clashes: OK, I don't care if they're adopted and therefore not genetically related, if a brother and sister get married it's still incest. Also, I'm kind of against roughly 20 year old slightly insane women getting together with significantly older (I'm talking at least 40) men. That's how you end up being past your prime at 35. I'm not sure about this older man fixation thing.
Overall: Your fairly typical closed room scenario, with red herrings being thrown out all over the place. I guessed who was going to be next to die, but not who did it until just before the reveal.
4. The Clocks.
First published 1963.
Brief plot set up: A typist turns up for a scheduled appointment at a house in a confusingly laid out suburb and finds a dead man (who hadn't made the appointment). Oh and four new clocks on the mantlepiece above the body, which is where the title comes in. The police, a member of the British Secret Service and Hercule Poirot investigate. The investigations become more urgent when another body turns up.
People: The 1920s adenoidal housemaid has mutated into an adenoidal typist, the Secret Service man is the son of one of her previous detectives, the new detective is competent. Hercule Poirot must be in his 80s or 90s by now - he barely stirs from his flat but investigates by remote, using the two men as proxies. Also there's the trendy young typist who found the body, a blind woman whose house the body was found in, people defecting to Russia (you were wondering how the Secret Service got involved, right?), a martinet running the typing agency and some other suburban residents.
Culture clashes: Typewriters! Phone boxes! Typists! People hiring typists to type handwritten manuscripts (including one hysterical excerpt from a romance novel) and take dictation!
Overall: Poirot aging made me sad, he's not really in the story much. The twists weren't bad, I was curious to see how she'd get the various threads to hang together but they did in the end.
5. Elephants can remember.
First published 1972.
Brief plot set up: Ariadne Oliver (a.k.a. "Mary-Sue Christie") is buttonholed at a literary lunch by a Large Formidable Woman, who demands that she investigate the deaths of her potential daughter-in-law's parents, for eugenic reasons ("did her father murder her mother or the other way around?") Despite initial hesitations Mrs Oliver does just that (after consulting with the daughter-in-law, who is her god-daughter). She calls on the aid of her friend Hercule Poirot to help.
People: Poroit is still mostly housebound, but more active. Mrs Oliver is initially irritating but gets less so as the book progresses. The Large Formidable Woman remains Large and Formidable. The god-daughter, the son, the parents, the mother's sister and various ex-servants and ex-colonial friends of the parents make appearances. Well in the memories of other people in the case of the parents!
Culture clashes: OK, Agatha, how old were you by this point again? The mother was thirty-five when she died. 35 is Not Old, nor "past her prime". Even if she was married to a 65 year old - I seriously wondered if she was supposed to have been 45 and there was a typo. Although I did get a laugh out of the dissing of late 60s/early 70s wedding fashions: "I don't think weddings are nearly as pretty as they used to be in our day. Some of them seem to wear such very peculiar clothes. The other day one of my friends went to a wedding and she said the bridegroom was dressed in some sort of quilted white satin and ruffles at his neck. Made of Valenciennes lace, I believe. Most peculiar. And the girl was wearing a very peculiar trouser suit. Also white but it was stamped with green shamrocks all over." Why do I have the distinct feeling that this was from life?
Overall: Well I guessed the solution from about half way through the book - a little bit too obvious, particularly once they mentioned a certain relationship - but I enjoyed the ride. Although not the increasingly tortured "Elephants" metaphor - people remember things. Yeah, we know and elephants don't forget. You've told us what, several thousand times?
6. Ordeal by Innocence.
First published 1958.
Brief plot set up: A doctor arrives to tell a family that the son who was convicted of his mother's murder was, in fact, innocent. (Pity he died of pneumonia in gaol then.) This of course only leaves one problem - if he didn't do it, who in the family did?
People: Previously hen-pecked patriarch, now on the verge of re-marriage to his former secretary. Swedish former masseuse, who had lived with the family since world war two. Oldest, emotionally aloof daughter, married to a former fighter pilot who since contracted polio and is wheelchair bound. Extremely Angry Son, who is still rebelling against his mother. Quiet, shy daughter. Extraordinarily mercurial and possibly developing some form of mental illness daughter. And a solid English Detective and Very Dry Lawyer to round them out.
Culture clashes: OK, I don't care if they're adopted and therefore not genetically related, if a brother and sister get married it's still incest. Also, I'm kind of against roughly 20 year old slightly insane women getting together with significantly older (I'm talking at least 40) men. That's how you end up being past your prime at 35. I'm not sure about this older man fixation thing.
Overall: Your fairly typical closed room scenario, with red herrings being thrown out all over the place. I guessed who was going to be next to die, but not who did it until just before the reveal.
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Date: 2010-09-12 11:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-09-13 12:16 am (UTC)The wedding fashions cracked me up, not least because it brought back memories of the photos of what my dad wore in 1974 as the Best Man. It was a very trendy 1970s wedding...