The Hollow

Poirot is invited for a weekend getaway to the countryside manor, where the host family is entangled in a web off intrigues and love triangles. He arrives to see a murder scene staged just for him. Or is it really staged? The Hollow is a different kind of Poirot novel. It takes nearly half of the book to get to the murder and for the famous sleuth to appear. The first hundred and fifty pages, or so, are dedicated to the introduction of all the characters. Christie spends much more time on the development of each one, which was rather refreshing from her general stock of stand-ins. However, because I am already used to a certain format, I couldn’t help but feel like something was missing. That something was of course Poirot taking central stage. He really doesn’t have a very big part in the book, which made it somewhat unappealing to me. The mystery itself is rather unengaging and relatively simple too. Overall, it feels that Christie took a different approach this time around – one that didn’t really work for me.

It's an okay read but a real nothingburger of a mystery.

an absolutely flawless book. I thoroughly enjoyed it from start to finish. I find myself a lot of the time wanting to read books simply to say I have and cross them off my list but this I genuinely enjoyed every page. Not many books make me want to read the authors entire works but this did. I truly see why she has earnt the title ‘queen of crime’

I think I could read Hercule Poirot mysteries over and over again and never get bored. I know some of the stories by heart and have seen their film adaptations but I still enjoy reading them very much!

Read for Read Christie 2021 Challenge. Yes I'm aware I was a bit behind on finishing it mid-February. I was going to read Agatha Christie chronologically last year but halted in order to do this challenge. This one is the first Hercule Poirot I read that doesn't feature Hastings (last one was The Murder on the Links and I definitely did not enjoy his presence). I like how this one is written in multi perspectives of all the suspects as well as Hercule Poirot himself, instead of only one narrator telling the story like in Agatha's earlier books. TBH I did not like John Christow's character from the start. Henrietta Savernake can say all the good things about him but he's still a man who cheated on the wife that he married as an overcorrection from his previous relationship. Henrietta's character kinda confused me as well. As an independent and intelligent woman who works as a sculptor for a living, she sure did put herself really low in front of her lover. The love story between Midge and Edward is kinda nice tho.

Yes I signed up to Read Christie 2021 - it was inevitable haha. Anyway this is the January pick - the theme was books set in a grand house - and it's a really unusual one, I can't decide even after rereading how I feel about it. It's much less about solving the murder and much more about the people involved, what makes them tick, and how they relate to each other. Yes, Poirot is there, puzzling away, searching for the truth but there's no sense of urgency about catching the killer. Other reviews have complained that he's too much in the background but it worked for me. If you want a Christie that's trying to do something a bit different I'd definitely recommend this.

Another mystery I had read before and there was so much I could remember! I remembered the clay statues, the dropped gun, the silly wife, the country house with the pool. I think this book was great when it came to the characters and their thoughts. Each is different and I liked how the Angkatells were all so weird, especially lady Angkatell, I found her so funny. Henrietta was great too, and I somehow really felt for her and related to her situation. At first I could kind of understand John, but by the moment he was killed I couldn't stand him anymore. The mystery was great and I could not solve it at first. (view spoiler)[I find it crazy that in the first chapter we are told that Gerda mostly acts stupid because she likes that people don't realise who much smarter she is and end up doing things for her. Even knowing this, when we find her with the gun near her dead husband, we fall for her act anyway. (hide spoiler)] I think this was a brilliant deception.

4.5 Amazing! I love how Agatha can picture human emotions and passion. I love her every day more