Agatha Christie 100 - Mrs. McGinty's Dead

The first Poirot novel of the 1950s, and it's apparent that Christie has now dialled down the increased interest in character psychology that we found in most of her 40s Poirots.

Superintendent Spence (returning from Taken at the Flood) comes to visit Poirot, because he's just been involved in a case where all the evidence points to a rather unsatisfactory young man having murdered his landlady Mrs. McGinty, so much so that he's just been convicted of the crime. But Spence has doubts and implores Poirot to investigate the case from all angles.

As I mentioned above, the character heavy plots from the 40s have been replaced here with something more akin to what we could have expected from a 30s Poirot. It is also the novel that re-introduces Ariadne Oliver into Poirot's life - she will make an appearance in over half of the Poirot novels from here on. In this one she doesn't appear until around the halfway mark, and doesn't really take any part in the investigations.

This is a clever mystery, and we get to follow Poirot as he turns over every stone and finds a clue in some ink that Mrs. McGinty bought just the day before her murder. Very nicely done by Christie, and the main misdirection when it comes to the murderer's identity is very well handled.

Ariadne Oliver's griping about her detective character and Poirot's stay at the guesthouse belonging to the hapless Summerhayes couple are sources of some gentle humour, which feels rather welcome after the previous, more serious Poirot novels.

In my last Poirot post, I wondered whether that was the last great Poirot story, but Christie shows she's still got it here, and I'll award this an 81 out of 100. A rather excellent read.

1953

1967

1971

1987

1990

Another direct translation of the title for this early 50s novel. Five Swedish editions, though by now it's becoming apparent that apart from the more prominent titles, there hasn't been much Christie action on the Swedish market since the 90s...

The 50s cover is fine. Again, it looks semi-humorous - as humorous as a cover with a dead woman's legs can look, at least. I wonder why the G in the title is yellow, though. For the Zebra edition from the late 60s, we get the Fontana cover. As usual, it looks pretty good with a number of items that are important to the investigation in the story.

The cover from 1971 is from Delfinserien (and also the one I own), and as usual with that edition, it's drawn by Per Åhlin. I like how surreal it looks, with the broom sticking out of the chimney and the other cleaning utensils lying scattered about, much larger than the house itself.

The 1987 cover is from a book club edition, and wonder of all wonders, I actually like it a lot. It might help that I owned it for a long time, but I think this is a kind of cover that works well for a mystery. The 1990 cover is also fine. Like the Fontana cover, it features a couple of items of import for the investigation, though the brighter colours make it less effective, in my opinion.