More fun with Agatha Christie

[betweensunandmoon]

I've decided that Murder on the Orient Express is my favorite of her books for the time being. If I had to pick one to adapt into a film, it would be So Many Steps to Death (originally published as Destination Unknown). It's a Bond-esque spy thriller about missing scientists and a suicidal young woman who gets enlisted by a government agent to help find them. (It makes sense in context.)

Comments

[igenlode]

I've got seventy of her novels on the shelves here, but apparently not that one, under either title (nor do I have any recollection of the scenario in question...) Though I'd have to sort them into alphabetical order to be certain!

[betweensunandmoon]

:O That's quite a collection! Where did you get them all?

I know you said you didn't have a favorite, but are there certain ones you like better than others?

[igenlode]

I inherited a second-hand collection :)

So my copies tend to have the original titles, and indeed some may be duplicates that were reissued under new names -- I didn't check them, I just counted from end to end of the shelf. I also have a complete Dorothy L. Sayers, D.K. Broster (acquired via rare book sellers in the days before the Internet) and Mary Stewart...

I think I probably have read all the Agatha Christies, but not more than once if so, and they tend not to leave much impression -- so when I pull one off the shelf I can't remember who did it ;-p

Some I definitely like less than others (the ones she wrote very late in life tend to be unsatisfactory, not least because she wasn't really in touch with present-day culture at that point, so the attempts at being up to date feel like window dressing). The ones I remember are the obvious tricksy ones, like "The Murder of Roger Ackroyd" and "Murder on the Orient Express", and those are not really my favourites.