Black Coffee.


'Black Coffee' by Agatha Christie.
Originally a screenplay,it is adapted as a novel by Charles Osborne.

A large country house, a family gathering, a missing scientific formula and a dead body. These are the essential ingredients of this novel.
Sir Claud Amory has discovered a scientific formula, a formula for explosives.
'... the force of Amorite, as I call it, is such that where we have hitherto' killed by thousands, we can now kill by hundreds of thousands.'

His cosmopolitan family and friends gather at his house, at his request. Sir Claud is not comfortable with quite a few of them and fearing trouble invites Hercule Poirot to join the gathering and 'exercise his little grey cells'.

However, before Poirot's arrival 'Morphine and Strychnine are all part of the conversation and Sir Claud explains the intricacies of his library, the holding room of the scientific find.
'This place is a rat-trap.'
he explains,

and they await the arrival of 'The Rat- catcher?' ----------
Poirot arrives with his assistant Colonel Hastings. The scene that greets them is not what they expected... and so they must entangle family feuds, delve into the world of international spies and comfort old flames before the mystery is solved.

A short novel, just 188 pages. It was good, but not the best 'Agatha' I have read . I found it a little slow at times. I wonder as it was originally a play, perhaps live action may have enhanced it.

Comments

Linda Jacobs said…
I've never read this one. Probably won't, either!

Wow, what a picture of the cat!

And your flowers are beautiful!

The word verification for this comment is "readr." Very appropriate for a reading blog!
JoAnn said…
The description sounds good, but perhaps the adaptation to novel form just doesn't work well. Oh well, will you read another Agatha Christie next?

I finally posted my review of The Enchanted April and wanted to thank you. I loved the book, and your blog was the first place I heard about it.
Kerrie said…
Mog, don't forget to submit this to the Agatha Christie Reading Challenge Blog
Anonymous said…
I like the title ;)

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