Helpful Score: 1
A Miss Marple mystery. Great characters and plot, as usual.
On a Caribbean holiday, Miss Jane Marple encounters the wealthy invalid Mr. Jason Rafiel. Classic Agatha Christie!
I really love Agatha Christie's "Miss Marple" books, and this is another good one. Interesting setting, sympathetic (and unsympathetic) characters and a well-crafted puzzle.
A review from Amazon.com:
Miss Marple escapes the rigors of an English winter, thanks to her nephew, the successful mystery writer Raymond West. He has sent Jane on a Caribbean vacation and it is at the Golden Palm Hotel on St. Honore that we find her with her ever-present knitting needles. After the eventful life she has led in St. Mary Mead, however, Miss Marple finds the island life a bit boring. But all that is about to change rather quickly. It begins one day when another elderly guest, Major Palgrave, is about to show Miss Marple a photograph of someone he claims is a murderer who got away. He stops short when four other guests approach, any of whom may have heard the conversation. A chambermaid telling tales and two murders are pivotal in this mystery that Miss Marple solves with her usual shrewd detection skills. Notable to this book is the introduction of Jason Rafiel, an ill, rude, and extremely rich guest we will hear of again in "Nemesis." He recognizes in Miss Marple a kindred spirit and together they form an effective partnership which prevents further murders.
Miss Marple escapes the rigors of an English winter, thanks to her nephew, the successful mystery writer Raymond West. He has sent Jane on a Caribbean vacation and it is at the Golden Palm Hotel on St. Honore that we find her with her ever-present knitting needles. After the eventful life she has led in St. Mary Mead, however, Miss Marple finds the island life a bit boring. But all that is about to change rather quickly. It begins one day when another elderly guest, Major Palgrave, is about to show Miss Marple a photograph of someone he claims is a murderer who got away. He stops short when four other guests approach, any of whom may have heard the conversation. A chambermaid telling tales and two murders are pivotal in this mystery that Miss Marple solves with her usual shrewd detection skills. Notable to this book is the introduction of Jason Rafiel, an ill, rude, and extremely rich guest we will hear of again in "Nemesis." He recognizes in Miss Marple a kindred spirit and together they form an effective partnership which prevents further murders.
The sun-drenched island of St. Honore was just what Miss Marple's doctor had ordered--and its Golden Palm Hotel, just the genteel resort for an elderly lady of comfortable habits.
But wickedness is the same the world around, and when old Maj. Palgrove died suddenly, Miss Marple knew the garrulous ex-soldier had told one tale too many. It was murder--and not the last, unless Miss Marple could ask the right questions--in time!
But wickedness is the same the world around, and when old Maj. Palgrove died suddenly, Miss Marple knew the garrulous ex-soldier had told one tale too many. It was murder--and not the last, unless Miss Marple could ask the right questions--in time!
If you are alert to clues, you will ID the killer about half-way through the book. But then Agatha throws more red-herrings out and you are led astray.
This is one of my favorites of Agatha Christie. I like the play between Miss Marple and Mr Rafiel. This book is the precursor to Nemesis.
There is something about Agatha Christie that I truly enjoy. I intersperse these mysteries among my other reading so I don't become jaded. I liked the interplay between Miss Marple and a wealthy, old gentleman who helps her solve the murders. A man who plans to murder his wife kills the wrong woman and the plot begins to tangle from there. It's typical Miss Marple who observes so carefully and finally with a little help uncovers the murderer. I liked it.
Miss Jane Marple is vacationg in the caribbean when a man is murdered.
People are dying to get out of this Caribbean resort. Any why not? Miss Marple is on hand. The key to solving these heinous crimes seems to be that the first victim has only one eye and that in looking past Miss M's shoulder his good eye (the right one) can only perceive an object that is beyond her left shoulder. The murderer, after offing a guest and a maid, attempts to do in his wife, except that he kills the wrong woman. Hmmmm! Can't even identify his own wife. This together with more identity crises make this merely more mindless reading. Meanwhile Miss M (referring to herself as Nemesis) has teamed with a wealthy, old curmudgeon to solve the case.
