Death on the Nile
1937
- belgians
- fiction
- hercule poirot (fictitious character)
- private investigators
- english detective and mystery stories
- murder
- historical fiction
- mystery
- romance
- poirot, hercule (personaje literario)
The story
The tranquillity of a cruise along the Nile was shattered by the discovery that Linnet Ridgeway ( Linnet Doyle) had been shot through the head. She was young, stylish, rich and beautiful. A girl who had everything... until she lost her life. Hercule Poirot recalled an earlier outburst by a fellow passenger: 'I'd like to put my dear little pistol against her head and just press the trigger.' Yet in this exotic setting nothing was ever quite what it seemed...
What it’s like
Crisp, mid-century English prose with the brisk elegance of a country-house mystery: sun-struck decks, white linen, the heavy stillness of a river steamer drifting between palms and sandbanks. Christie's voice is light and wry, full of clipped dialogue and tidy observation, so the pages feel like a card table in a warm lounge, with the Egyptian heat pressing faintly at the edges. The mood is glamorous and faintly sinister rather than dark; the violence is a single offstage shooting, reported and then examined rather than dwelt on, with no gore and no real cruelty on the page. Pacing is steady and conversational, built from interviews, overheard remarks, and little reversals of expectation, so it reads well in short sittings. The romance is gentle and mostly observed from the outside. It suits a lazy afternoon, a long train journey, or a comfort reread when you want puzzles and polished manners without anything that unsettles. Made for readers who enjoy clever deduction, witty social comedy, and an old-fashioned sense of order restored by the final page.
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