Despite being our shortest month, February carries a lot of responsibility on its shoulders. It’s the month when two of America’s most important presidents were born, when the Chinese celebrate the lunar New Year, when winter’s length relies on a bashful groundhog, when Catholics mark their foreheads with ashes, and when the jazz and booze … Continue reading WHAT’S LOVE GOT TO DO WITH IT: Agatha Christie’s Best Couples

Here is how Agatha Christie remembers it: She and Madge were discussing one of the newly published mystery novels they had both read and enjoyed. Christie believes it was Gaston LeRoux’ The Mystery of the Yellow Room, which would place this event around 1908. At this time, the two sisters occasionally dabbled in writing; Madge … Continue reading THE FIRST POIROT

Only a week or so ago, I admittedly got a little gossipy insinuating how Agatha Christie’s first marriage to Captain Archie Christie may have informed her work. (Read it here.) Just think: if Christie had honored her previous engagement to Reggie Lucy and married that faithful old duffer, perhaps her output would have contained fewer adulterous cads … Continue reading AN AUTHOR ABROAD: Agatha Christie’s Foreign Mysteries