Book Review: Murder in the Orient Express

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Book Report

Title of the book: Murder in the Orient Express
Author: Agatha Christie
Date started/Date completed:06/10/2019
Date of publication: 1934
Pages: 236
Genre: Mystery

Author

Agatha Christie was an English writer of crime and romantic novels. She is best remembered for her detective stories including the two diverse characters of Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot. She is considered to be the best selling writer of all time. Only the Bible is known to have outstripped her collected sales of roughly four billion worldwide copies. Her works have been translated into more languages than any other individual writer.

Agatha Christie was born in Torquay, Devon 1890 to Clarissa Margaret Boehmer and a wealthy American stockbroker. She was brought up by both her mother and her sister. In the First World war, she trained and worked as a nurse helping to treat wounded soldiers. She also became educated in the field of pharmacy. She recalled her time as a nurse with great fondness, saying it was one of the most rewarding jobs she ever undertook.

Agatha Christie’s married an aviator in the Royal Flying Corps – Archibald Christie in December 1914. The marriage was somewhat turbulent and ended in divorce in 1928, two years after Archibald had begun an affair. In 1926, Agatha Christie disappeared for 11 days. The circumstances were never really resolved and it created widespread media interest in the disappearance of this famous novelist. She was eventually discovered in a Harrogate hotel eleven days later. Though Agatha Christie never said why it was probably a combination of shock over her mother’s death and the discovery of her husband’s affair. In 1930, she married her second husband, Max Mallowan. This marriage was happier, though her only child, Rosalind Hicks, came from her first marriage.

Writing Career of Agatha Christie

Agatha Christie began writing in 1920, after the end of the First World War. Her first story was The Mysterious Affair at Styles, (1920). This featured the soon to be famous detective – Hercule Poirot, who at the time was portrayed as a Belgian refugee from the Great War. The book sold well and helped meet the public’s great appetite for detective novels. It was a genre that had been popularised through Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories at the turn of the century.

Agatha Christie went on to write over 40 novels featuring the proud and immaculate Hercule Poirot. Like Conan Doyle, Christie had no great love for her own creation – Poirot seemed to be admired by the public more than the writer herself. Agatha Christie preferred her other great detective – the quiet but effective old lady – Miss Marple. The character of Miss Marple was based on the traditional English country lady – and her own relatives.

The plot of Agatha Christies novels could be described as formulaic. Murders were committed by ingenious methods – often involving poison, which Agatha Christie had great knowledge of. After interrogating all the main suspects, the detective would bring all the participants into some drawing room before explaining who was the murderer. The psychological suspense of the novels and the fact readers feel they have a good chance of solving the crime undoubtedly added to the popularity of the books.

During the Second World War, Christie worked in the pharmacy of the University College London, which gave her ideas for some of her murder methods. After the war, her books continued to grow in international popularity. In 1952, her play The Mousetrap was debuted at the Ambassador’s Theatre in London and has been performed without a break ever since. Her success led to her being honoured in the New Year’s honour list. In 1971 she was appointed Dame Commander of the British Empire.

She died in 1976 aged 85.

Citation: Pettinger, Tejvan. “Biography of Agatha Christie”, Oxford, www.biographyonline.net 5 February 2013. Last updated 1 February 2018.

Questions about the book

                                                                                                                        

Rating of book (1/10):

8/10

Briefly summarize the book

The dectetive Hercules Pirot, was in the train because he was going to travel and he started to talk with a beautiful lady. The next day, Mr. Hubbard was murdered and Hercules started to do reasearch of the case, and ask the passengers about the victim. Then he discovered that the men who was murdered was an assassin named Cavalini. Also, he discovered that nine of the twelve passengers had a relationship with the case. 

At first he tough that the person who murder Cavalini was a woman, but then he saw 12 knifes in Cavalini is body. In the end he was told that the murder of Cavalini was an enemy that  escaped from the train, and the case was solved 

Describe the character/person who changed the most from the beginning of the book to the end of the book. Explain the change and what caused it.

No one presented a change in the book

Describe a minor character/person in the book who had major importance. Explain.

Helena because she was guilty of comitting the murder of Cavalini and also because she had the mayor relationship with the Armstrong case. 

Describe one major external conflict and one major internal conflict found in this book.

Internal conflict: Hercules contradicts himself of who was the assassin.

External conflict: Finding the assassin of Cavalini

Above you rated this book. Explain in detail why you gave this book that score.

I gave it a eight because the case was interesting, but I got confused with the final of the story

Evaluate the end of the book. Considering how the book unfolded, is it an effective ending? Why? Why not?

No, because the case was unsolved and the assassin was gone 

If this book had gone one more chapter, what would have happened? Explain

The police will find the assassin and put him on a trial 

Choose five (5) of the following sentence starters and write a brief reflection for each. 

1.I noticed Cavalini looked suspicious

2.I wonder if Hercules was sure that the case was closed

3.I was reminded of Sherlock Holmes cases 

4.I think the murder is still unsolved 

5.I’d like to know if Hercules will chase the assassin 

Author’s purpose

The author is purpose is to entertain 

Intended audience(s)

 the intended audiences are teenagers from 14 years old-17 years old

Read you later!

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