When the season calls for cheerful murder mysteries

My ‘mystery winter’ reading theme continues and this week I decided to turn to the ‘Queen of Crime’ herself: Agatha Christie.

I asked my sister, a whodunnit expert, for her recommendation. She immediately suggested “The Murder of Roger Ackroyd,” a Poirot mystery considered by many to be Christie’s masterpiece. Not only is the plot suitably twisty and the setting suitably typical (richest man in a sleepy village found murdered in a locked room of his posh house), but the characterizations are downright hilarious. And the final reveal, which exploits the conventions of the mystery genre to deliver a truly unconventional denouement, is a testament to Christie’s skill.

Next up was her 1941 mystery, “Evil Under the Sun,” set in a glamorous seaside hotel. It evokes the particular claustrophobia of many social novels, where the characters feel controlled and scrutinized because they are part of the same wider web of class and society, even if they don’t really know each other. (If you need a last-minute Christmas gift and have $19 million to spare, the island and hotel that inspired the novel For sale.)

Next on my list is ‘The Penguin Book of Murder Mysteries’, which The Times crime critic promises is full of ‘overlooked and underrated’ gems from the 19th and 20th centuries.

I also have my usual stack of political science and history books, but for now I’ll leave them on my desk. I’m taking a break for the holidays, so The Interpreter will be off for the next few weeks. And while I generally find that kind of reading fascinating and enjoyable, I feel a greater than usual need to disconnect from the news and its historical antecedents. So for the next few days at least, I’ll be all fiction.

Happy New Year to you all, and thanks for reading, emailing, and otherwise being part of the wonderful interpreting community. See you in January.

Reader Comments: Books you recommend

Shava Nerad, a reader in Arlington, Massachusetts, recommends “When Victims Become Killers: Colonialism, Nativism, and the Rwandan Genocide”, by Mahmood Mamdani:

I reread this because of the dynamics of the Israel-Gaza conflict. It is an analysis of the Rwandan genocide with many thoughts on human nature and dehumanizing neighbors. Difficult to read – but worth it.