Customer Reviews

The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding: A BBC Full-Cast Radio Drama (BBC Audio Crime)

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This book is well worth reading if you are a fan of Agatha Christies, Hercule Poirot. Poirots first taste of a traditional English Christmas ends in him solving the disappearance of a Princes ruby. After recieving a sinister note warning him not to eat the Christmas Pudding, a mysterious visitor in the night and his host nearly choking on the Christmas Pudding he sets a trap for his suspect and a joke on the children of the household. Not only in this story does Poirot retrieve a stolen ruby but he also helps his hosts to rid themselves of a problem of their own. This is a brilliant book and well worth the read.

Agatha Christie serves up mayhem in six well-plotted stories. Originally released in 1960 at a time when an annual "Christie for Christmas" had become an anticipated tradition for the reading public, the famous author broke with tradition and gave readers a novella length new Poirot tale which was used for the title and combined it with four older Poirot stories and one older Miss Marple story.

"The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding," according to the author's own foreword, recalls the pleasurable Christmases of her own at her brother-in-law's home (Abney Hall) in the north of England. Christie was enchanted by huge country house Christmases that included stockings at the bed in the morning, the Church service with all the Christmas hymns, a dinner of gargantuan proportions, presents, and the final Lighting of the Tree. Even in her older years, this was still a wonderful memory to her so she dedicated this book to the hostess who gave her such fond memories. In this tale Poirot experiences these same treats as he pursues a red ruby stolen by a young woman who has stolen it and the affections of a prince betrothed to a woman in his own country. In a secondary plot, the master sleuth also manages to intervene in the romance of his host's granddaughter and avert a practical joke in the form of a mock murder.

"The Mystery of the Spanish Chest," is a longer version of "The Mystery of the Baghdad Chest," originally published in 1939. In this Poirot and his erstwhile companion Hastings become involved in the murder of a man whose stabbed body is found stuffed inside the elaborate chest of a man rumored to be the lover of the dead man's wife.

"The Under Dog," originally published in 1951, concerns Lily Margrave, paid companion to Lady Astwell. She seeks Poirot's help in solving the murder of her employer's husband who has been killed in the tower of his estate. Though all circumstances point to a nephew who has argued with the deceased, the widow is sure someone else killed her husband.

"Four and Twenty Blackbirds," originally published in 1950, is the tale of a murder concerning eating habits. While dining one evening, Poirot notices a lone man whom he discovers has been eating at this restaurant every Tuesday and Thursday night for a decade. When he learns the diner came in on Monday night the week before, his little gray cells are activated and he is soon on the trail of a murder.

"The Dream," originally published in 1939, features a reclusive and eccentric millionaire who summons Poirot to his home to interpret his recurring nightmare of committing suicide. An usual request for the dapper detective, but one which he handles with aplomb.

"Greenshaw's Folly" had appeared previously in a magazine in 1957 but this is its first publication in book form. It is also the lone Miss Marple story in this collection. Raymond West, Miss Marple's novelist nephew, is travelling with a literary critic whose hobby is collecting architectural monstrosities on film. The two visit Greenshaw's Folly, a hideous Victorian mansion now occupied by Miss Greenshaw, a spinster who is the last of the Greenshaw family. West arranges for his wife's niece to help Miss Greenshaw edit her grandfather's diaries and while doing so, the niece witnesses the brutal murder-by-arrow of Miss Greenshaw. The gardener, an avid archery buff, is accused, but it will take Miss Marple's acute perceptions of people to solve this murder.

I can't say enough about how Agatha Christie is the queen of mystery writing. No matter if you are into the hard-core P.I.'s, the bumbling amateur detectives, the Police dramas or cold hard forensic stories, you still can't touch Agatha Christie for classic mysteries! This is such a joy to read---especially if you love Hercule Poirot! I loved this book.

"The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding" may not be the most auspicious title for an Agatha Christie novel, particularly when one takes into account her tendency for high body counts and gory deaths, but the subtitle "and a selection of entrees" reveals Christie's intentions for this particular short-story anthology. "Christmas Pudding" is just a bit of fun, dedicated to the memory of her Christmases spent as a child at her brother-in-law's house.

The six stories here are long enough to be described as novellas, with the first five starring Christie's most famous Belgian detective Hercule Poirot, and the sixth featuring her spinster sleuth Miss Jane Marple. All the stories are vintage Christie, though they contain more of a romantic air this time around, with stories that feature stolen rubies, Spanish chests, precognitive dreams, hypnotism, tower rooms, and old run-down estates.

In "The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding" Hercule Poirot is called away from his cozy winter apartment in order to spend Christmas with the Lacey family. The police have reason to believe that the priceless ruby, stolen from a foolish Indian prince, will turn up in this particular household. Begrudgingly, Poirot accepts the invitation and is introduced to the Lacey family - which includes a group of children who plan a "murder" for their guest. It doesn't take a stroke of genius to guess where the missing ruby ends up. All that Poirot has to deduce is how it got there, and how the children can help in the capture of the culprit.

"The Mystery of the Spanish Chest" deals with the gruesome discovery of a body inside the titular chest. Mr Clayton was stabled to death at some point during a soiree taking place at Major Rich's apartment, at the same time he was meant to have been called away to Scotland on business. All the evidence points to Major Rich, especially since he's in love with Mr Clayton's beautiful wife Margharita - but Poirot is not so convinced he's the murderer. Perhaps Shakespeare's "Othello" holds the key...

A lady's companion's reluctance in summoning Poirot to a murder scene only piques his interest in the case, and he travels to the house of the Astwells to investigate the death of the bad-tempered Sir Rueben Astwell. Once again, there is a suspect to whom all the evidence points, but the victim's wife insists that it was her husband's secretary that is responsible - her intuition is never wrong! But the case itself seems clueless, and Poirot has to resort to several psychological games in order to unearth the murderer.

"Four and Twenty Blackbirds" and "The Dream" are the two shortest stories in the anthology, and the most simplistic. In the first Poirot is intrigued over the tale of a long-time patron at a certain restaurant suddenly changing his dinner order for no discernable reason, something casts suspicion over his death a few days later; in the latter Poirot is summoned to a wealthy businessman's office in order to discuss the precognitive power of dreams. Benedict Farley has been having a reoccurring dream each night in which he shoots himself in the head at exactly twenty-eight minutes past three. Poirot is at a loss to explain the phenomena to his client, but sure enough, Mr Farley commits suicide just a few days later. Did the dream come true, or was something even more sinister at work?

Finally, "Greenshaw's Folly" moves from Mr Poirot to Miss Marple. Whilst staying with her nephew Raymond West, Miss Marple gets a secondhand account from his wife of the strange occurrences at Greenshaw's Folly, the ramshackle old estate that bankrupted its original owner. With something of a turf war going on between the housekeeper and the gardening boy, Mrs West tries to keep her head down as she organizes old Mrs Greenshaw's memoirs. To her horror she is witness to the old woman's murder, watching helplessly from within a locked room as Mrs Greenshaw is shot dead with an arrow. All possible suspects have an alibi - so whodunit?

These are not Christie's finest by any means. The culprit of "Christmas Pudding" is so obvious that it becomes a case of how rather than who, and Miss Marple's solution to "Greenshaw" seems to have been pulled out of a hat. But you can tell that Christie had a lot of fun with these particular mysteries, especially the first, where the warmth and fun of a typical English Christmas has been drawn straight out of her own memories. There are numerous cameos from various side-characters, including Miss Lemon the efficient secretary, George the devoted manservant, Raymond West the successful novelist and Doctor Stillingfleet (who pops up again in Third Girl), and because of the relative simplicity of the plots, many readers may find that Christie is unable to pull a fast one on them - so long as they pay careful attention to the clues.

After reading several of Agatha Christie's detective novels, I was somewhat disappointed by this collection of short stories. While a few of them are clever, the short length of each story is insufficient for the character development that is Christie's hallmark. The plot tends to be too simple and predictable.

This is one of those books that evoke warm, cozy images of a proper English Christmas. I have owned the hardcover of this book for over a decade and it's a private little Christmas tradition for me. I read it every year, sometimes several times, and this warm story in the typical Hercule style gets me into the holiday spirit.

Disappointed that these were short stories, and not Agatha's best. I love her work, but these were a bit too pat.

Great facsimile of original UK version book.

Agatha Christie does not dissapoint her readers. Thoroughly enjoyed it.

This is a good starter book if you have never read an Agatha Christie mystery before. Poirot is one of her re-occuring characters who is as smart as he is odd. In this case, he has to uncover the mystery of how a ruby got into the pudding of the family he is staying with in England. Many other odd things start unfolding and he has to use his guile to solve it. This character is better than her Miss Marple in my opinion, so people new to this genre should really try it out.