The One Year With Agatha Christie- My Adventures with Hercule Poirot!

I have always wanted to read the Hercule Poirot series by Agatha Christie for as long as I could remember. I couldn't because well given the restless and compulsive reader I always have been, I wouldn't have exercised self-control (as there are around 40 books in the series- novels, not including the short stories), I made a deliberate decision to forgo the series back in the days when I was in school.

So, in September, 2014- I bought a Kindle. I have already written about it once before how I enjoyed reading on my Kindle, so I will not gush about the pros and my Kindle experience again. So having bought a Kindle, and having literally the world for an oyster, I vowed in 2014 that I would read the entire series and make up for the lost time.

The year is over, and I am so happy that I am finished with the series. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience of going through each book. Agatha Christie is truly a literary genius. Good authors have this annoying habit of often repeating themselves, but not Christie. She will give you the slip at any point you feel cocky and try to get ahead of yourself.

The best thing about reading Agatha Christie is how Hercule Poirot would say, “It's all about the victim, and the psychology”.

The characters and the intricate plot is always so believable. Christie in all her novels has always based the motive on the Seven Cardinal Sins. The motive is always simple, the characters not so much. They all exhibit shades of grey.

Much like the criminals, even Hercule Poirot himself is not spared from the fallacies of the human nature. In One, Two, Buckle my Shoes he is shown to be someone who takes the high moral ground by preserving the sanctity of life by putting behind the bars a man on whom the entire stability of a nation depends- a man who professes to kill not for himself, but for what he believes is patriotism. But in the Murder of Orient Express, he lets go of the killer(s). Oops! Spoiler over there! :)

Hercule Poirot like his namesake- the Greek hero, is proud, vain and patronizing. But he is acutely aware of his personality and disposition which he himself reflects upon from time to time, providing comic relief- along with Capt. Hastings, his valet, and Poirot's own reflections on his socially awkward secretary.

Ideally, a review of the entire series is supposed to follow. However, yours truly has grown a lazy streak over the past year. I feel lazy when it comes to writing, and honestly a lack of enthusiasm as well. But given the stupendous effort which went behind this particular blog entry, I will however list the absolute must reads from the series in chronological order.

• Murder of Roger Ackroyd
• Lord Edgware Dies
• Murder on the Orient Express
• Three Act Tragedy
• Murder in Mesopotamia
• Cards on the Table
• Dumb Witness
• Sad Cypress
• One, Two, Buckle My Shoe
• Evil Under the Sun
• Five Little Pigs
• Taken at the Flood
• Mrs McGinty's Dead
• After the Funeral
• The Clocks
• Elephants Can Remember

I hope anyone who reads this write-up is inspired to take up the series. I believe people immortalize themselves when they publish a book in ink. However, very few of them are able to make a mark as strong as Agatha Christie. The books are to survive any generation- of that I am sure.

Happy Reading!