This is the year that I will finish reading Agatha Christie, and what that means is that I have just a few left, and the ones that are left are not her best work. I long ago read And Then There Were None, along with all of the rest of the Poirot mysteries. I’ve finished Superintendent Battle and Colonel Race, and most of Marple (although I am saving Sleeping Murder for the end, because I’ve heard that it doesn’t suck).
When I started figuring out which titles I had left, I realized that I had almost all of Tommy and Tuppence Beresford. This is the third in the series, following The Secret Adversary and Partners in Crime. When we left Tommy and Tuppence, at the end of Partners in Crime, Tuppence had just announced to Tommy that she was pregnant (after ridding the world of an espionage ring). In N or M?, many years have passed, and the twins, Deborah and Derek, are both young adults.
N or M? was published in 1941, in the midst of WWII, and, at the beginning of the book, Tommy and Tuppence are feeling their age. They can’t find anyone to give them an opportunity to serve Britain in the war, and they are a bit down in the mouth about it: the secret service doesn’t want Tommy, and Tuppence has been turned down for a nursing slot. Their children, in the inimitable manner of young people, have cheerfully decided that mum and dad should shuffle off and spend the war years in a decline somewhere – the kids have got this war covered.
When a man approaches Tommy to take on a job rooting out a pair of German spies (code names N and M) without Tuppence, Tuppence is having none of it. He sneaks off to Sans Souci, a seaside boarding house where intelligence suggests the spies are operative. When he arrives there, Tuppence is sitting in the common room knitting a balaclava. Point one to Tuppence.
One of the best things about Tommy and Tuppence is Tommy and Tuppence. They still have their signature witty banter, and their relationship is good fun. Even after all these years, they still like each other alot, and it shows in their interactions. Occasionally, things get a bit twee with the pair, and there is an annoyingly adorable plot moppet named Betty who accidentally reveals a secret while she is babbling on with Tuppence.
Christie’s espionage stories are never as good as her straight up mysteries, and this one dragged for about the first 30%. Things do pick up, though, when Betty is kidnapped, and then Tommy goes missing and Tuppence must figure out the identity of the spies with the help of one of Deborah’s friends, Anthony Marsdon, who is a young code breaker. Bring in their old retainer, Albert, and the book comes to a solid and entertaining conclusion. I figured out half of the solution, which with Christie is about as good as it gets.
If you’ve never read Christie, definitely don’t start here. If you already like Tommy and Tuppence, give this one a go – while they are slightly less effervescent in N or M? than they were all the way back in The Secret Adversary, the characters are still a lot of fun. If you’re looking for a place to start reading Christie, though, start with one of her best: And Then There Were None, Murder on the Orient Express or The Murder of Roger Ackroyd.
A Note: This is my first CBR review, and I hope I am doing it right! Also, if you enjoyed this, you can find more of my reviews on my blog All The Vintage Ladies where I review books written in the 19th and 20th centuries by women authors.
There is no wrong way to do a CBR review! Well, as long as there are at least 250 words, and you’ve got that more than covered :)
Your first paragraph really resonates with me because I just finished my first Agatha Christie that I didn’t like. So I think, to avoid saving the bad ones until the end, I’m going to find out which ones are bad and read those first, and then get to the good ones after. I’m very far away from the end, though. I think I’ve only read like seven or eight?
There are something like 66 of them! Don’t read all of the bad ones first, or you’ll never get to the good ones – I would intersperse some of the weaker ones with the good ones, since the good outnumber the bad (IMO). And unless you are going to be a completist, there is no reason to subject yourself to Passenger From Frankfurt. It’s one of the worst books I’ve ever read.
Which ones have you read?
I’ve read:
The Murderous Affair at Styles
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
Murder on the Orient Express
Death on the Nile
The Murder at the Vicarage
The Body in the Library
They Do It With Mirrors
A Murder is Announced
Death Comes as the End
and the one I just finished, which is the only one I haven’t liked, The Big Four. And yeah, I’d probably intersperse the bad ones. Reading them all in a row would be unbearable. And I am a completionist, so I will eventually read them all.
What are the others you think are bad?
Oh, and I read Death in the Clouds.
Crap, and I’ve also read And Then There Were None. So I guess I’ve read more than I’d thought!
The Big Four is terrible! Destination Unknown isn’t very good. Mystery of the Blue Train is pretty bad, but not as bad as The Big Four, which is the worst of the Poirot mysteries by far. You’ve managed to read some really good ones so far.
I love Ariadne Oliver, and she’s in some of the later books. Her first appearance is in Cards on the Table, where Christie brings together all of her non-Marple recurring characters. I also really liked Dead Man’s Folly with her. She’s a Christie self-insert and is a hoot!
One of my favorites is Sparkling Cyanide with Colonel Race. It’s a great mystery! You have so much awesome Christie goodness before you that I’m jealous.
Good to know, thank you!
You did a great first review! CBR is a “whatever works for you” kind of place, and as narfna says the only hard and fast rule is having 250 words of opinion.
Welcome!
Thank you!
Good job partner!
So good to see you here!
It’s a great first review! I’ve read several Christies, along with the notable ones I like Cat in the Pigeons a lot, and the least I liked was Death in the Nile, felt like a drag.
Thank you! I also loved Cat Among the Pigeons – Miss Bulstrode is a favorite character. I really enjoy Christie’s secondary characters – she has the ability to sketch a character in just a few words but with such completeness that I feel like I know them!
Congrats on your first review…and I think I will have to make this (gasp) my first Christie D :
Haha! Good luck – I hope you like it (although I still think that you should read a different one first)!