Let's Bust a Recap : Death on the Nile

Well, if you're reading this, thanks for staying with me on this never-ending saga of "Has she quit blogging forever, or will something pop up randomly after a month and a half of silence?"

Listen, I did not accurately factor in how the World Cup would negatively impact my reading life—much less my blogging life. It's my all-time favorite sporting event and it only comes around once every four years. You'd think I would have given a thought to how planting myself in front of the TV for eight hours a day to watch the beautiful game would have an effect on the rest of my life, but no. Not a hope of that. 

Anyway, I'm popping back in today to try to make a dent in the To-Be-Blogged stack and to assure anyone wondering that yes, I do in fact intend to keep up this little hobby of mine, however sporadic that may look.

And the book I plucked at random out of the stack for today is Death on the Nile by the Queen of Crime herself: Dame Agatha Mary Clarissa Christie, Lady Mallowan, DBE. 

If you've followed this little corner of cyberspace for any length of time, you may remember that I'm still a bit of a Christie newbie. I've only read two of her other novels (in 2017 and 2018 respectively), and after reading And Then There Were None, went on a bit of a Christie strike thinking no other book of hers could possibly be worth it after that brilliant display of murder-mystery prowess. 

I knew the strike was destined to end sometime, however, as I continued to collect her books and add them to our home library. Since my recap of And Then There Were None at the end of 2018 (at which time I only owned three of her books) our Christie collection has grown to a whopping 28 of her novels. And when friends of ours invited us over to watch the new movie released this year, I begged for a little time to read the original work first. 

So about halfway through September, I re-entered the world of Agatha Christie to read her 1937 rendering: Death on the Nile.

And I have to say: Agatha did it again. 

In Death on the Nile, our famous Belgian, Hercule Poirot, is approached by the effervescent Linnet Doyle (previously Ridgeway) on board the steamer Karnak (cruising down the Nile—hence the title) about the matter of her ex-best friend Jacqueline de Bellefort stalking and harassing her and her new husband Simon. Linnet, who is independently wealthy and has everything she could possibly want, stole Simon away from poor Jackie, and ever since their marriage, Jackie has been popping up everywhere they are and making them feel terrible about themselves. 

But when Linnet turns up dead in her cabin one night after Jackie makes a huge scene with Simon and a little pistol, this case of harassment turns into a murder mystery that only Poirot could solve. As he delves deeper into the details, he finds that nearly everyone on board has a reason to want Linnet dead. But who actually killed her?

I won't ruin it, but wow. How does she do it? Once again, Christie tied my brain in absolute knots trying to figure this one out, and once again, I was left gobsmacked by the final resolution. If you've never read anything by Agatha Christie, Death on the Nile would be a great one to pick up. 

The movie, on the other hand, was a bit of a letdown. Opposite to my experience with Murder on the Orient Express which was wonderful up until the end where everything seemed to fall apart; Death on the Nile seemed to drag on and on, but then Branagh really stuck the ending. They significantly cut down the cast which took away from the brilliance of Poirot solving the case, and just added in a lot of awkward, unnecessary bits that didn't do anything for the story except maybe make it a little more relevant to contemporary culture. Gag me. Our little group had a good time watching it though, and then I had the satisfaction of being questioned about what was changed from the book. 

Interestingly, I found myself reading an article recently about the All About Agatha podcast. I'm not a podcast listener myself (though I've tried), and these Agatha experts rank Death on the Nile #9 out of all Christie's mystery novels. And for anyone wondering, that's 66 novels. I was thunderstruck to see that they had the gall to put And Then There Were None at #2, but also intrigued. I actually own a copy of Five Little Pigs (though I have an American edition titled Murder in Retrospect), and now I'm at a loss as to how to decide my next Christie novel. All along, I'd been planning to read The Murder of Roger Ackroyd next (which you'll notice is #3 on this list), but then that got upset by Death on the Nile this year. Not to mention, I still haven't read a Miss Marple mystery yet. 

SEND HELP.

All told, I'd definitely recommend Death on the Nile, and somebody please tell me which Agatha Christie novel I should put on next year's reading list! This link should take you to a list of the 28 I own on Goodreads if you feel so inclined to help a sister out. 

Where do you land on the scale of Agatha Christie fandom if 1 was "Agatha who?" and 10 was "I have a poster of her in my bedroom"? Any other World Cup watchers out there? Who do you choose in the final: Argentina or France?