The 8:55 to Baghdad: From London to Iraq on the Trail of Agatha Christie and the Orient Express [Paperback]

Andrew Eames (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 2, 2006

In 1928, Agatha Christie—the world’s most widely read author—was a thirty-something single mother. With her first marriage falling apart, she has decided to take a much-needed holiday—the Caribbean has been her intended destination, but her mind was changed during a dinner conversation, and five days later she was off on a completely different trajectory.

Merging literary biography with travel adventure, and ancient history with contemporary world events, Andrew Eames tell a riveting tale and reveals fascinating and little-known details of this exotic chapter in the life Agatha Christie. His own trip from London to Baghdad—a journey much more difficult in 2002, with the political unrest in the Middle East, than it was in 1928—becomes ineluctably intertwined with Christie’s, and the characters he meets seem like they could have stepped out of a mystery novel.

Fans of Agatha Christie will delight in Eames’s descriptions of the places and events that appeared in and influenced her fiction, and armchair travelers will thrill in the exotica of the journey itself.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Agatha Christie fans, as well as connoisseurs of fine travel writing, will relish British journalist Eames's gripping, humorous and eye-opening account of his train and bus trip across Europe and the Middle East on the eve of the second Gulf War. A chance stay in a Syrian hotel where Christie once stayed prompts Eames to attempt to follow in the bestselling author's footsteps. Despite the awkward timing, Eames (Crossing the Shadow Lines: Travels in South-East Asia) finds many friendly faces, even in Iraq, where a close call with a mysterious explosion curtails his journey. Admirers of the creator of Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot will learn more about her relationship with the peoples of the region (Kurds, Armenians and Palestinians), as well as the real-life inspiration for her classic 1934 novel, Murder on the Orient Express: a blizzard that stranded the historic train for nine days in 1929. Especially engaging is the way Eames describes his traveling companions on the last leg of his odyssey as if they were the cast of characters in a typical Christie mystery. (May 31)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist

In 1938, when she was 38, Agatha Christie took a 3,000-mile train ride on the Orient Express from London to Baghdad. Eames retraces her journey, describing many of the places and events that influenced Christie's fiction. Along the way, he offers some background on her early life: her father died when she was 11, she later married Max Mallowan, an archaeologist. Eames relates a brief history of the Orient Express and recounts his visits to Baghdad, Damascus, Trieste, Zagreb, Belgrade, Sofia, Istanbul, and other cities. Throughout, he writes about the people he met--fellow passengers, taxi drivers, hotel managers, guides, and military escorts--and the hotel rooms he stayed in. Armchair travelers will enjoy the journey. George Cohen
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 401 pages
• Publisher: Overlook TP (May 2, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1585678023
• ISBN-13: 978-1585678020
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.1 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #790,562 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Remember When Baghdad Used to Sound Exotic?, October 5, 2005

By 

takingadayoff "takingadayoff" (Las Vegas, Nevada) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The 8:55 to Baghdad: From London to Iraq on the Trail of Agatha Christie and the Orient Express (Hardcover)

Journalist Andrew Eames follows in the footsteps of Agatha Christie as he retraces her route from London to Baghdad on the Orient Express. Christie traveled to the Middle East many times and enjoyed her visits there. When she visited, before World War II, places such as Damascus and Cairo and even Baghdad evoked romantic and exotic images. Eames's journey takes place in 2003 when even Lawrence of Arabia might think twice about going.

Eames sleeps through the European part of the trip, eager to get to the more challenging Belgrade and Serbia and beyond. On the way, he recalls what it would have been like in Christie's time and observes what it is like now. Sometimes, as in the London suburb where he begins the journey, not much has changed. Often, as in Belgrade and certainly Baghdad, things are much different.

8:55 to Baghdad hurtles from familiar to exotic to frightening and back again. When things start to get too gritty and real in Serbia, Eames takes us back to the days of luxury aboard the Orient Express. When the company of pre-WWII upper class snobs threatens to become boring, we are whisked onto a bus to cross the border into Iraq on the eve of war in 2003.

All along the way, Eames recalls Christie's career and her life. She enjoyed accompanying her archaeologist husband to the Middle East and didn't mind roughing it from time to time. Roughing it back then meant camping out at a dig in the desert without running water. Roughing it in Baghdad in 2003 meant dodging bombs.

Even if you are not a Christie fan, there is a lot to enjoy in this narrative. The Orient Express, archaeology, modern history, travel essay, it's all here. It reminds me of Beyond the Blue Horizon by Alexander Frater, another British writer. In it, Frater sets out to travel around the world using only routes that Imperial Airways would have flown. Imperial Airways was the pre-WWII airline of the British Empire, so that meant Frater had to do a lot of puddle-jumping on small propeller-driven airplanes in Southeast Asia and the Middle East. Both he and Andrew Eames mix past and present to come up with unique and memorable travel stories.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I wish I took this trip, October 9, 2005

By 

karriela (Pasadena, Ca) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The 8:55 to Baghdad: From London to Iraq on the Trail of Agatha Christie and the Orient Express (Hardcover)

I'm a big fan of Agatha Christie and travel books and this book seemed like it would be a great combination of the two. It was and it was much more. Eames deftly handles the bio-history of Christie, the juxtaposition of her trip 75 years earlier with his modern day experience, as well as giving very sharp insight into the people and history of today. I was especially interested, and surprised, to read his detailed accounts of traveling through the recently peaceful Balkans and the people he encountered. I had not expected that element of the travelogue and was intrigued by his experiences.

Also of interest were his travels along what was the Taurus Express--the rail line that ran between Istanbul and Baghdad. These now mainly muslim countries that still held so much evidence of the imperialist occupation by European countries were of great interest to read about--especially given that many of those countries are not safe to travel.

Christie's remarkably brave trek from London to Baghdad as a lone female in 1928 was equalled by Eames' much more hazardous trip on the brink of a major war.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Perfect holiday read, August 1, 2005

By 

Susanne Pleines "Susanne" (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The 8:55 to Baghdad: From London to Iraq on the Trail of Agatha Christie and the Orient Express (Hardcover)

This book is a real treat. A journey by train all the way from London to Baghdad, just before the invasion of Iraq. In the footsteps of Agatha Christie. At first sight it seems an odd mix of travel adventure and literary biography, and it does change pace regularly, just like the trains Eames travels with. But there are some real insights in here, and some great pieces of observational writing. I particularly liked the bits in Slovenia and Serbia, and of course the final bus trip across the desert to Baghdad. Highly recommended.