Book Review

mmm…let’s see…

Of late the books I have been devouring on (yeah I do that) have mostly been the classic “whodunits” or murder mysteries written to excite the mind of the logician prevalent in every reader.

Advancing from “Sherlock Holmes”, I found a similar character ( in not that many ways actually ) in Hercule Poirot. My most recent analysis ( yeah I do that too ) , is the one I present here , “Death in the clouds” by Agatha Christie featuring Hercule Poirot.

mmm…let’s see…as far as the story or the plot goes, “Death in the clouds” is nothing short of fantastic ! I mean , the plot , as usual with Christie , is this –eluding, seemingly impossible to commit or solve , and progressively gets tougher to solve --mystery.

Figure this for a moment. There are 11 passengers on a plane(including our detective) and one of them dies ( as abruptly as that.No drama) that’s the necessity part of a whodunit. Now , it’s found that she ( yeah it’s a she) died from a blow-dart shot to her neck!

This is the point of arrival of “seemingly impossible” part of the crime.A blowpipe is found ( quite inconveniently behind Poirot’s seat) . But the “impossibility” is that no one saw a blow pipe being fired ( or blown) and there is no part on the plane where a person could blow a dart from a blow pipe, unseen. And she should have been killed while on the plane. The medical evidence makes sure of that and the closeness of the story. Confines the story to a defined set of suspects. The passengers and the two stewards!!

Seems impossible? Worry not!! Here’s our master sleuth Hercule Poirot to the rescue!

On the face of it nobody has had a contact with the murdered woman. But with Hercule Poirot on the loose almost everyone is found to have a motive! Now it’s his “grey cells” as he calls them which have to come to the rescue.

The story moves at a steady pace , at times, driving the reader to jump to conclusions. There are few points of “adrenaline increase” too (only slightly though) scattered here and there with perfect precision. The best in my opinion being Poirot’s growing interest in a wasp seen by few passengers.

So what happens in the end? Does Hercule Poirot pull another “ Hercule Poirot”?
mmm….let’s see….for the surface reader…..Definitely!

The crafting of the typical “final speech” where everything , every mystery , every move of the detective is explained is simply in league only with the class of Agatha Christie and this time with a dash of pride ( and arrogance?) from Poirot’s side. To a Christie first-timer its cocaine. For a newbie Christie it damn good!

Yeah I know I have said “surface reader” somewhere above. That, in my language alone, means a person who reads a book for the story part of it. i.e. accepting the line of thought of the author.

For the non-surface reader (especially whodunit ‘anal’ysts) who tend to criticize and question every “logician’s solution” provided by the author, this one is questionable in many places. And an acute reader might just be able to contradict the actual solution itself!!

So final verdict??

Must read.