Customer Reviews

Destination Unknown

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

As usual, when Christie boots Poirot and Mrs. Marple, you're in for an adventurous and fun book. It all starts when a harried detective stops a girl from committing suicide and asks her to step in the place of a dead woman in order to solve a mystery. From then on you have mayhem, danger, and sweeping romance. Trust me, this is a great book--especially if you're a little bored and depressed yourself!!!

This 1955 novel is a departure from her more well known cosy series books. This one has none of her more familiar characters like Poirot or Marple, the setting is mostly the North African desert and centers on a James Bond type conspiracy complete with secret hideout and mysterious, fabulously wealthy mastermind.

Hilary Craven has been defeated by life, her daughter has died, her husband has left her and she has nothing left to live for. She has decided to leave England and in an out-of-the-way spot in Morocco end it all. Circumstances intervene and instead of a quiet end in a lonely hotel room Hilary finds herself cast in the role of secret agent.

This is a rather standard thriller type novel. Although a departure from Christie's usual fare there are still many of her more familiar motifs. The 'hero' is a single woman off on a adventure (like MAN IN THE BROWN SUIT), there is also a 'master criminal' (like the Tommy and Tuppence series or PASSENGER TO FRANKFURT) and much of the action takes place in an isolated, contained environment. As always in Christie's work the clues are all there for the reader to follow right up to the surprise ending.

For those who had enjoyed children adventure books like those written by Enid Blyton or Capt WE Johns, this book would
have fit right in.

Unlike other novels by the writer, this book is not a mystery
book but an adventure book. There is no who-done-it, though
there are few clues left around, there is no crime actually defined.

Scientists from the West have gone missing. When the wife of one such scientist went on a holiday, supposedly to recover from the trauma, British agents had her tailed, suspecting she could lead them to the whereabouts of the missing scientists. But when her plane crashed and she was seriously injured, the trail appeared to go cold. Enter Hilary Craven, a suicidal woman who bore a passing resemblance. Offered a more exciting way to die in an almost certainly fatal missiong, she eagerly took the chance.

Not knowing what she could expect to find, the British agents could brief her little except to play-it-by-ear. As they hoped, she was accepted as the supposed wife, and led to be with her supposed husband. But as closely as the British agents trailed her, the adversary was a step ahead to outsmart the shadowers and Hilary found herself in an unexpected place, with even more unexpected encounters.

Would she survive, or would she be exposed as an impostor? The strangely diverse people she had for travelling companions on her way to the lair of the enemy made her wonder if the whole business was what it really appeared to be.

In Hilary, the writer had a perfect character for such a mission, a person who had no desire for self preservation, and could mold herself into another being who had a dual purpose in life, one as a impostor wife, another as an undercover agent.
To paraphrase a line from a popular song, when she fooled the others, she fooled herself as well and through the ordeal, she actually became the force which pushed others to cling on to hope, and eventually, regaining her sense and purpose of existence.

A highly enjoyable book, in the cast of adolescent adventure but written for adults.

I read this book a number of years ago and am still fascinated by it. I think that this is one of Ms. Christie's best books.

Hilary Craven, the heroine of this story, wishes to commit suicide. The sleeping pills are on her bedside table and all is ready for self-imposed death when a knock on the door changes her plans. A young man tells her the story of a nuclear physicist who has disappeared. Hilary, intrigued by the drama, agrees to impersonate the scientist's wife and begins an improbable masquerade that leads her deep into Africa to an unknown destination.

This is a book you will probably want to read in one sitting because of its breathless excitement which culminates in a surprising ending.

I know this book has an indifferent reputation and it is sometimes compared unfavorably to Christie's preceding thriller, THEY CAME TO BAGHDAD. But over the years I've come to prefer DU to BAGHDAD, maybe as I've grown older and more reflective. The insouciant and devil may care heroine of BAGHDAD, Victoria Jones, was once more appealing to me, and the social comedy of that book remains a delight. But now I am in a Hilary Craven state of mind. If you ask me, Hilary Craven is one of Christie's greatest accomplishments as a character, and her gradual transformation during the events of her "ritualized suicide" is so skillfully done it's hard to see how it could be improved.

At first she is a frightened, despondent mess, as a result of catastrophes in her personal life, a broken marriage, and the death of her only child, a little girl. She keeps obsessing about Brenda, the dead girl, and visualizing the pathetic tiny mound of her grave. She decides to commit suicide and nothing is going to stop her. Christie takes you deep inside Hilary's mind, and her decision seems perfectly rational and even moral, and then fate knocks at her door. In a way we've heard Christie tell this story before, because a would-be suicide turns into the hero of TOWARDS ZERO, and we get some idea of her philosophy on the subject--don't kill yourself because of the butterfly effect, and you never know when you might save someone else's life if only you live. DESTINATION UNKNOWN shows signs of Christie's interest in French existentialism, and the questions it asks are pretty deep ones. What is the price of personal freedom? Is freedom an illusion? In paradise--real or imagined--is there any freedom of choice? If humans are infinitely adaptable and can get used to anything, where is the spark that separates us from the animals? Is identity itself a learned response?

Another one of Christie's espionage potboilers contains one of her best female protagonists. Hillary Craven starts out a tragic figure and becomes by the end, a clever, determined and complex character. Slight comparisons to Passenger to Frankfurt, which expands on the disappearing scientist thread more chillingly. As usual, Agatha tops off the adventure with some nice final twists.

A thriller type. Her knowledge of the middle east from her husband's excavations, Max Mallowan, puts her--and us--in the picture. Wonderful fun.

Often underrated by Agatha purists.

Whenever Agatha Christie stepped away from her usual detectives Hercules Poirot and Miss Marple, the entire tone of her novels would often shift from mysteries (often called "cozies" on account of their English village settings) to espionage/conspiracy thrillers. This is especially true of "Destination Unknown" which spans several countries and a lengthy passage of time, with special agents, government officials and wealthy masterminds making up (most of) its cast.

It deals with the scenario of several international scientists disappearing without a trace. International governments are getting concerned as to where they've all gone, and whether they're being kidnapped or going of their own volition. The most recent disappearance is that of Thomas Betterson, who leaves a potential lead in the form of his wife Olive. The officials in charge of the case are certain that she knows more than she's letting on, but are finding her a tough nut to crack...

Hilary Craven has nothing to live for. After her daughter dies and her husband leaves her for another woman, she prepares to commit suicide. However, she is just about to overdose on sleeping pills when she hears a knock at her hotel door. It is a perfect stranger who saw her buying a large quantity of sleeping pills and who has a proposition for her. If she does in fact long for death, why not go out in a blaze of glory? British agents have been tailing Mrs Betterson to Morocco hoping that she would lead them to her husband, only for her to die in a plane crash. Since Hilary has a passing resemblance to the dead woman, would she be willing to take her place and hopefully discover what happened to the missing scientists?

The set-up is ridiculously unlikely, and yet utterly compelling. Christie draws out the suspense of where Hilary is going and what she will find when she gets there to perfection, crafting a dream-like atmosphere that is nonetheless grounded in reality by the devastating planning of the secret organization that whisks Hilary and her fellow passengers into the unknown. It would be hugely remiss to discuss what it awaiting Hilary on her strange adventure, but I suppose it's fair to say that after such a magnificent setup, any revelation comes as something of a disappointment. Yet perhaps that's the point, as Christie once again draws upon her oft-used theme of the inherent small-mindedness of megalomania and the strength of those dismissed as ordinary.

"Destination Unknown" is certainly not one of Christie's best books. Though most of her mysteries demand a re-read in order to pick up on the clues and red herrings strewn throughout the plot, the enjoyment of "Destination Unknown" hinges on the suspense of Hilary's journey. Once over, there's little reason to revisit it, despite the last-minute shoehorning in of a mystery that is only tangentially connected to the rest of the plot. There are a couple of loose ends and some characters that remain unaccounted for, but on the whole it makes for an intriguing but light read.

Much like a cross between "They Came to Baghdad" and "Passenger to Frankfurt" (with a dash of "Toward Zero" thrown in, what with a wannabe-suicide finding a new purpose in life) Christie draws heavily on her own travelling experiences to map Hilary's journey and her own belief system to explore the nature of power, freedom, progress and knowledge - raising some weighty philosophical questions along the way.

Destination Unknown is possibly my favorite Christie novel. It is filled with twists and turns and follows an incredibly likable woman named Hilary Craven who must pretend to be someone she is not. She is faced with a mysterious journey where each step takes her closer to danger and further from her previous life. Her goal is to find a missing scientific genius who has vanished into thin air. The reason for the disappearance is absolutely impossible to deduce until the very end. One of the main themes of this book is: the acceptance of inevitable captivity.