Review: The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie

The Mysterious Affair at Styles is my second Agatha Christie. This was her debut book, a closed room murder being investigated by her famous detective Hercule Poirot. Emily Inglethorp, a wealthy older woman with a new younger husband, two sons, one who is in financial trouble and another who seems to hold resentment towards his mother, and a bevy of other people surrounding her, is found dead in her bed.

I have previously read and enjoyed, And Then There Were None, and though I would start at Christie's first novel with my continuation of her works. I had a fine time reading this book and will probably pick up a few more of her book in the future, partly because I already own a few.

I enjoyed some aspects of this book. I liked trying to solve the mystery along with Poroit; I liked the wide array of characters and getting to see everyone's potential motives. I did not enjoy the narrator at times. I just found the way he made incorrect assumptions a tad heavy-handed. But I thought that he was alright as a conduit of the story.

I did not like a few things about this story. I thought getting to the resolution was a bit overly complicated. I didn't like the way Christie portrayed the Jewish character, some of his ill-treatment was not condoned by the story, but much of it seemed in line with the moral center of the book. This was written during WWI, but it is hard not to view the book with the lens of knowing what is to come.

I am writing this about a week off, having read it, and am struggling to remember much else about my reading experience. This book was just not that memorable for me. I gave the book three stars on Goodreads and The Story Graph.