A Caribbean Mystery by Agatha Christie
Reviews
Who else can think like her, the Queen of Crime?
A Caribbean Mystery.
Like Hercule Poirot's mystery "Evil under the sun" this is a Miss Marple mystery where Miss Marple is sponsored a holiday by
her nephew to a Caribbean Island and she longs for something exciting to happen. Miss Marple finds herself in the midst of
old retired people who like to live in the past by telling stories about past happenings and things heard from friends,
rumours. And it is one these gossips which bring about the death of Major Palgrave who tells stories about his past as a
soldier and about murderers and he finds himself about to show a snapshot of a murderer to Miss Marple and something which he
sees stops him from showing the snapshot of the murderer. And the same day the Major dies and it is considered as natural
death when a certain drug for hypertension is found in his room. Miss Marple thinks something fishy about his death as she is
not able to get the snapshot of her murderer from his valet. So she is of the suspicion that someone in the island is the
murderer who had silently murdered Major Palgrave by giving a overdose of a certain drug and made others believe that it was
natural(It is Miss Marple who expresses that she thinks something is unusual in the death of Major Palgrave, as Major
Palgrave has never complained of high blood pressure in the past). Two more murders are committed before the culprit is
tracked down by Miss Marple. Miss Marple old and fragile is quite not satisfied basking in the Carribean island as she wants
something to happen that keeps her busy. Well, as usual this is the second time I am reading this book by getting it from the
local library. This story from the start gives some false clues and misleading events for both Miss Marple and the reader and
in the end you get a twist. You learn about something that helps Miss Marple find her murderer. Miss Marple plays the role of
a foolish old maid for much of story as she attempts to solve the mystery. The murders happen in a resort set in the
Caribbean island.
The characterization of each and every person involved in the story is well built up. From the headstrong rich old man to his
valet Mr. Jackson. Well, there are three murders in all committed in this story apart from other murders which are related to
this story. There are around 10 people involved in this story with Miss Marple being one among them.
The tone of the story is suspenseful.
Agatha Christie's A Caribbean Mystery written in 1964, is a 224 page novel with 25 chapters that I completed reading in two
days(I would have liked to finish it in a day but could not as I had other urgent pending work which I had to complete
sideby). At a point of time in the climax of the story, I had to really stop all urgent work and continue with the reading to
know the murderer. It is an irrestible read if you are a Agatha Christie fan.
Cost: £16.99 as given in the book( I got it from the local library).
The cover page is that of a person with a snapshot in his left hand and a glass in his right hand. Only the lower half face
of the person seen in the coverpage and the posture shows that he is keenly watching the snapshot. Lower half shows Agatha
Christie(in a dirty blue color )A Carribean Mystery(in white) and a quotation of Sunday times about this novel "THERE IS NO
MORE CUNNING PLAYER OF THE MURDER GAME' SUNDAY TIMES.
The paperback edition costs about £5.59 from Amazon and it is also available in Audio CD. BBC dramatizations and movies made
from this story are also available.
