The ABC Murders

Quite rightly, this is regarded as one of Agatha Christie's best works and one that departs from a plot revolving around a crime or crimes in a single specific location but opens up into a plot involving the whole of the country. It was published in 1936 to critical acclaim.

The plot begins with the return from south America of Hastings who has been away ranching with his wife. He is the narrator of the story. He stays with Poirot and they reminisce about previous adventures together and speculate about whether a new one might be about to start. And so it does with the arrival of the first of a series of letters in which Poirot is taunted with the confirmation that a murder is about to be committed . The letters are signed by ABC and at each murder scene a copy of the ABC Railway guide is found near the body. 

Although it is often mentioned that Poirot is retired, this is a vigorous and active Poirot. The final denouement which takes place in the last few pages of the book turns things on their head and provides a very clever and satisfying resolution to the story.

Chief Inspector Japp features in the book but is somewhat eclipsed by the newly introduced  Inspector Crome who is described as new type of policeman. It seems as if the police force is becoming ever more professional and attracting more educated officers - although it seems as if Agatha Christie is not so keen as she makes Crome out to be a rather superior and condescending individual around whom Poirot is able to run rings.

In this book Agatha Christie is exploring the idea of the serial killer decades before the term itself was adopted and before the heyday of the serial killer in the seventies and eighties. The book features alienists who in modern terms would be called criminal psychologists and who try to build a picture of the type of person committing the crime from the methods they use.

The taunting letters also have echoes of the Jack The Ripper letters from decades before and indeed presages those of the Wearside Jack letters that taunted the police at the time of the Yorkshire Ripper.

One other interesting aspect of this book is that she is very location specific and chooses to set the murders in real locations such as Andover, Bexhill and Churston. From the point of view of Torquay it is possible to get very close to the scene of the murder at Churston and even closer to the place where the murderer sat on Torquay seafront in one of the shelters in Princess Gardens.

As you would expect there have been a number of TV and film adaptations over the years. Regrettably, the most recent came from the truly awful Sarah Phelps whose woke arrogance meant that she pretty much completely re-wrote the story and actually made it a tedious watch. 

To see what other peple thought of the ABC Murders book click here