The Mysterious Affair at Styles

by Agatha Christie

eBook, 229 pages

English language

Published 2014 by Standard Ebooks.

The Mysterious Affair at Styles is a detective novel by British writer Agatha Christie. It was written in the middle of the First World War, in 1916, and first published by John Lane in the United States in October 1920 and in the United Kingdom by The Bodley Head (John Lane's UK company) on 21 January 1921.Styles was Christie's first published novel. It introduced Hercule Poirot, Inspector (later, Chief Inspector) Japp, and Arthur Hastings. Poirot, a Belgian refugee of the Great War, is settling in England near the home of Emily Inglethorp, who helped him to his new life. His friend Hastings arrives as a guest at her home. When the woman is killed, Poirot uses his detective skills to solve the mystery. The book includes maps of the house, the murder scene, and a drawing of a fragment of a will. The true first publication of the novel was as a weekly serial in The Times, including the maps of the house and other illustrations included in the book. This novel was one of the first ten books published by Penguin Books when it began in 1935. This first mystery novel by Agatha Christie was well received by reviewers in the UK and the US at initial publication. An analysis in 1990 was positive about the plot, considered the novel one of the few by Christie that is well-anchored in time and place, a story that knows it describes the end of an era, and mentions that the plot is clever. Christie had not mastered cleverness throughout her first novel, as "too many clues tend to cancel each other out"; this was judged a difficulty "which Conan Doyle never satisfactorily overcame, but which Christie would."

10 editions

Matt reviewed The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie (Hercule Poirot, #1)

A gripping mystery with an enjoyable conclusion

No rating

Agatha Christie's first book, this book is exactly what you expect from a classic piece of crime fiction:

There's a murder
An eccentric detective
Plenty of hints and red herrings
A fantastic conclusion wrapping it all up

You're constantly guessing whodunnit, and chances are you'll be kicking yourself at the end for not getting it, as all good detective stories do.

Agatha Christie's first book, this book is exactly what you expect from a classic piece of crime fiction:

There's a murder
An eccentric detective
Plenty of hints and red herrings
A fantastic conclusion wrapping it all up

You're constantly guessing whodunnit, and chances are you'll be kicking yourself at the end for not getting it, as all good detective stories do.

Matt reviewed The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie (Hercule Poirot, #1)

A gripping mystery with an enjoyable conclusion

5 stars

Agatha Christie's first book, this book is exactly what you expect from a classic piece of crime fiction:

There's a murder
An eccentric detective
Plenty of hints and red herrings
A fantastic conclusion wrapping it all up

You're constantly guessing whodunnit, and chances are you'll be kicking yourself at the end for not getting it, as all good detective stories do.

Agatha Christie's first book, this book is exactly what you expect from a classic piece of crime fiction:

There's a murder
An eccentric detective
Plenty of hints and red herrings
A fantastic conclusion wrapping it all up

You're constantly guessing whodunnit, and chances are you'll be kicking yourself at the end for not getting it, as all good detective stories do.

joelchrono reviewed The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie (Hercule Poirot, #1)

My first novel by Christie, super cool!

4 stars

Original review here

This book was a bit confusing at first with the dozen or so characters that are presented during the beginning chapters. However, I quickly familiarized with them—I still mixed up some of the last names but I knew who was who. It is a simple story in theory: a rich lady with an inheritance, a second husband, two sons and a wife of one, some servants, a doctor, you know the drill.

Honestly, this was very fun to read along someone else, after each chapter we each had our suspects and opinions on the cast, it was as entertaining as the novel itself every time Poirot explained his findings and changed our whole perspective on the events all the way up to the final reveal, which is just amazing.

It is funny and well written, a definite page turner for me, I read the …

Original review here

It is funny and well written, a definite page turner for me, I read the last four chapters altogheter because all the revelations and explanations were quite mind-boggling to me—also because isa kept reading ahead, so evil lol.

I recently acquired And Then There Were None, considered to be one of Agatha Christie’s best work, and one of the best selling books of all time, because if this one amazed me, I can’t help but wonder what her best writing would be like. Yes, I have an e-reader but I couldn’t help myself. Good stuff.

I might continue my read of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, just to refresh myself and see the way both fictional detectives work, and have some more fun outside of the Science Fiction genre.

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