Death in the Clouds (Poirot) [Paperback]

Agatha Christie (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 4, 2001 | Series: Poirot

A woman is killed by a poisoned dart in the enclosed confines of a commercial passeneger plane...From seat No.9, Hercule Poirot was ideally placed to observe his fellow air passengers. Over to his right sat a pretty young woman, clearly infatuated with the man opposite; ahead, in seat No.13, sat a Countess with a poorly-concealed cocaine habit; across the gangway in seat No.8, a detective writer was being troubled by an aggressive wasp. What Poirot did not yet realize was that behind him, in seat No.2, sat the slumped, lifeless body of a woman.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"It will be a very acute reader who does not receive a complete surprise at the end." Times Literary Supplement

About the Author

Agatha Christie was born in Torquay in 1890 and became, quite simply, the best-selling novelist in history. Her first novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, written towards the end of the First World War, introduced us to Hercule Poirot, who was to become the most popular detective in crime fiction since Sherlock Holmes. She is known throughout the world as the Queen of Crime. Her books have sold over a billion copies in the English language and another billion in over 100 foreign languages. She is the author of 80 crime novels and short story collections, 19 plays, and six novels under the name of Mary Westmacott.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Harpercollins Pb; Masterpiece ed edition (June 4, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 000711933X
• ISBN-13: 978-0007119332
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (37 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,120,997 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Agatha Christie was born in 1890 and created the detective Hercule Poirot in her debut novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles (1920). She achieved wide popularity with The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (1926) and produced a total of eighty novels and short-story collections over six decades.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

21 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Murder at the hands of Hercule Poirot?, October 9, 2002

By 

John Austin "[e-mail]" (Kangaroo Ground, Australia) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Death in the Clouds/Death in the Air (Hercule Poirot) (Paperback)

The mid 1930s were some of the best years of the so-called "Golden Age of Detective Fiction" in Britain. Most practitioners belonged to the Detection Club, they reviewed and promoted one another's books publically and privately they shared and re-worked one another's ideas. An example of this literary cross-fertilization may be seen when Freeman Wills Crofts' "The 12.30 From Croydon", 1934, and "Agatha Christie's "Death In the Clouds", 1935, are compared. Both books begin with a passenger plane flight across the English Channel. In the former novel, a passenger is found to be dead at the end of Chapter One when the plane touches down in Paris. In the latter, a passenger is found to be dead at the end of Chapter One when a plane touches down in London. Thereafter, and indeed in the titling of the two books, each writer develops the idea differently.

Agatha Christie devises a whodunit puzzle. Characters are displayed in terms of how they appear physically, in their dialogue, by reputation or hearsay. Clues and significant red herrings are tossed about so that the murderer might mislead everybody else, and the writer might mislead the reader. Just how misleading appearances might be, is cleverly contrived at one point in this book when a jury at an inquest into the passenger's death return a unanimous verdict of murder at the hands of another passenger, namely Hercule Poirot.

Agatha Christie, who lived to become the world's best-selling author, presents her puzzle in immensely readable but unsophisticated prose. The two dimensional characters are somehow easy to keep in mind as you strive to guess the murderer's identity and, of course, there is Hercule Poirot to unerringly point the finger. He can also voice a note of compassion with his oft repeated, "Ah, yes, life can be terribly cruel".

"Death In the Clouds" is recommended for reading during prolonged international flights or sleepless nights as an escape from stressful reality. Don't begin it, however, if you need a full night's sleep. It is possible you will want to keep reading through to the last page.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Sudden Twist, April 4, 2004

A Kid's Review

This review is from: Death in the Clouds/Death in the Air (Hercule Poirot) (Paperback)

A murder on an aircraft? Right, and within just a few feet of detective Hercule Poirot! I haven't read many books by Christie, but I knew this was going to be a good one...
And it was. It goes through a female passenger being murdered on a aircraft from Le Pinet, under everyone's noses unnoticed. Poirot is air-sick on the plane and is called upon the investigation. The mystery unfolds page by page, introducing new characters--suspects-- chapter by chapter. There were many varius suspects, and they never narrow down. There was a bit of a twist in the last few chapters of the story, well, for Poirot and another in the last chapter for the readers, yet it makes sense and draws in a nice ending. This is a definite page turner and a great read when you think you're bored, because with Christie's mysteries, you never know what's going to happen.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars When Poirot Travels, Murder is Always on Board, September 22, 2001

By 

Antoinette Klein (Hoover, Alabama USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Death in the Clouds/Death in the Air (Hercule Poirot) (Paperback)

This book (also published as "Death in the Air") is vintage Christie because of the way she has a murder committed in a roomful (in this case planeful) of people and yet no one can see this audacious murder being committed. Unfortunately for our killer, Hercule Poirot happens to be on board this flight from Paris to London!

The murder takes place during the serving of lunch and the victim is discovered to be a notorious blackmailer travelling under an assumed name. There is a melodramatic discovering of a poisoned dart containing a deadly South African snake venom nearby as well as a blow-pipe like the ones used by South American Indian tribes. But the astute Poirot utilizes his innate sense of order and method to wade through the many red herrings and unmasks the murderer through the evidence provided by luggage and pocket contents.

This mystery is notable for its well-defined characters. We become privvy to the lives of many of the passengers and learn to what extent they have been touched by the victim. A simple case of many with motive and opportunity, but only one will be unveiled by the master detective Poirot.

This is a light and fun read which enables you to match wits with Poirot and try to discover "whodunit" before he does.