Synopsis

Just after midnight, a snowdrift stops the Orient Express in its tracks. The luxurious train is surprisingly full for the time of the year, but by the morning it is one passenger fewer. An American tycoon lies dead in his compartment, stabbed a dozen times, his door locked from the inside.

Isolated and with a killer in their midst, detective Hercule Poirot must identify the murderer—in case he or she decides to strike again.

Murder On The Orient Express ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Genre: Mystery, Classic, Fiction, Crime
Author: Agatha Christie
Publisher: Harper Collins
Buy at: Amazon, Indigo

“I have learned to save myself useless emotion” ― Agatha Christie, Murder On The Orient Express

Review

Did I mention it before that I am a huge Agatha Christie fan? I am saying it now because this is my third book by her and I am still wondering how did she end up writing these amazing murder mysteries and that too in a less than 300 pages book. Murder On The Orient Express is the second most loved book by her and rightly so.

A train. A Murder. Multiple suspects. Each suspect has its motive to murder the victim. There is an alibi for everyone. Who is the murderer? Hercules Poirot knows and it is mind-boggling to follow the journey on the Orient Express with Hercules to find the murderer.

I felt like a detective myself following the leads but I wish I could be as sharp as Christie was! I read this book as a standalone in Hercules Poirot series. Now, I am excited to read more in this series.

Agatha Christie’s language is very clean. I have yet to read a book with numerous characters and yet non-confusing. Agatha does it every time for me. Her books have so many characters but they never tend to confuse the reader. All in all, I am impressed by her ingenuity again!

If you love classics, murder mysteries and plot settings on a train, grab this one!

I’ve only read one Agatha Christie before this one and I had been recommended this book a lot by Agatha Christie fans. This book has been rightly one of the World’s best selling books of all time, setting the standards of crime fiction.

The story involves around an island where ten random people from all walks of life are invited to stay in a solitary house on that island. They are murdered one after the another in a similar fashion described in a poem hanging in everyone’s room. If there is no one left on the island, who killed the last person? That’s the brilliance of Agatha Christie!

Christie didn’t need 500 pages novel to describe a murder. She described 10 murders in less than 300 pages. I could have never guessed the killer the whole time.

The settings of the island described in the book and twisted characters just show the brilliance of Agatha Christie. I would consider this book not only as a crime fiction but also a psychological thriller.

A highly recommended book for mystery and psychological thriller fans!

Miracle Creek - the nominee in "Goodreads Mystery & Thriller section" and so popular on social media platforms - it truly deserves so. I was sold after reading a few pages. It is a thrilling courtroom drama revealing the murder mystery as it goes.

This book is about family, community, and immigrants. The stress, challenges, and prejudices parents of children with special needs go through. A mother of a child with special needs is on murder trial of her own son. Her son and a lady died in arson caused in a treatment facility which was claimed to cure conditions from infertility to autism. The arson is suspected to have been caused by a cigarette smoked by her.

Brilliantly written from different character’s POV who are eyewitnesses to the arson, Angie left no stone unturned in the story writing and character development. It is one of the unputdownables for me which piqued my interest throughout.

Angie has beautifully drafted her debut and I can’t wait to read more of her work!!!

My first from Stephen King and I admit that it is one of my #instagrammademedoit books. Do I regret it? Absolutely NOT.

The Institute starts with Tim Jamieson who is an ex-policeman and ends up working as a night knocker in a small town. The story shifts to Luke, a 12 year-old boy, who is kidnapped after killing his parents and is held captive in an institute with other kids who have special abilities like Telepathy and Telekinesis. These kids are treated with atrocious experiments in secretly running Institute. This book is about the journey of many such kids who want to get out of this institute.

I am impressed by Stephen King’s storytelling technique. In the beginning, the story of Tim Jamieson seems so irrelevant when Luke’s story starts unfolding only to realize that Tim and Luke are going to cross each other’s paths in the strangest way possible. I have witnessed a great characterization. So many characters but none of them is losing the details.

I am amused by Stephen King’s apt for horrific details of the crime and also relieved at the same time that he is not a serial killer. His digs at Trump are entertaining in the book and show his honest frustration and distrust with the power. If the book wasn’t enough to keep me on intrigued, the author’s note at the end tore me apart.

I haven’t read any of his other books so can’t really compare “The Institute” with any of his previous books but this has definitely made me go for his other works!

My first book by Paula Hawkins. I wouldn’t say that I loved it but I liked it. I haven’t read her bestseller “The Girl On The Train” and I won’t be judging this book based on its predecessor.

The story revolves around a river that runs around the town and a single mother, Danielle Abbott, turns up dead at the bottom of the same river. There has been a history of deaths linked with the river and Danielle’s death dredges the secrets of all the deaths in the river dating back decades ago. Danielle’s sister, Jules, who left the town a long time ago and swore to never return, comes back to take care of Danielle’s teenage daughter.

I found the book slow at first but it all started making sense after 150 pages, and I was able to finish it in 2 sittings. There are so many characters in the story and the narration is penned from each character’s perspective. It wasn’t easy to keep track of what’s going on each character’s mind when there are 10 characters involved in details. There was a definite brilliance in writing from Paula Hawkin’s which brings the psychological suspense out with twists and turns. I wasn’t able to put the book down irrespective of certain flaws I endured while reading it.

I’d recommend It to fellow bookish people who haven’t read “The Girl On The Train” and they just like to read Paula’s work.

Did I ever announce that Anthony Horowitz is my favourite whodunnit author. I am saying it now. This is my third book from Anthony and probably, the best so far. I cannot even begin to imagine how the planning of this book would have been done. It is a novel within a novel and a murder within a murder mystery.

Magpie Murders consists two murder mysteries, one within another and both of them equally fascinating and unputdownable. Alan Conway, a murder mystery writer, gives his last book of whodunnit to publishers at Cloverleaf books. His book has double murder mystery but the last pages of his book are missing where the revelation is done. Before the publishers can pursue him for the missing pages, Alan is dead. Now, the editor of Cloverleaf house, Susan Ryeland goes after the missing pages not only to find the killer of the writer Alan Conway but also the reason of missing pages in his last book.

Magpie Murders is not only a whodunnit but it also implores the psychology and relationship of a whodunnit author. His relationships with his most prominent creation, his audience, his publishers, his family, his success and his failures.

It is an interesting, smart, well-plotted and superbly written novel in a Golden Age style mystery which has a mystery within a mystery. There were clues all over the book about whodunnit but I was never able to guess. I cannot recommend this book highly enough. Definitely the best whodunnit I've ever read!

Sherlock Holmes

I am such a sucker for the classics and especially after watching Sherlock Holmes series in one single loop, there was no doubt that I had to pick this literary piece. Did I regret? Not at all. Almost more than 125 years old but so technical and timeless!

This book has 2 stories:

A Study in Scarlet
The story is engaging and this is where Sherlock Holmes and John Watson are introduced to each other. Rest is history! I was a little confused at the abrupt revelation of the murderer but then there is a whole second part dedicated to the background story of the murderer which totally made sense and it was so different and unputdownable.

The Sign of Four
Definitely, more engaging than the first story in the book and all the locations mentioned were so relative to me as I grew up near those places in India. The description of periodic era of British Invasion of India, rebellions and treasure hunting - all up to the mark!

Sir Arthur Donan Doyle is a very talented and clever mystery writer and his books are always entertaining. He has done a brilliant job in jotting down all the suspense in a short book. Nobody can question the character development of Sherlock Holmes and John Watson as the whole world knows about them. Mr. Doyle's knowledge of medicine has been put to a great use by him for scientific deductions of Sherlock Holmes. I am a die hard Sherlock Holmes fan so definitely more Sherlock Holmes coming for me!

The Return Of Sherlock Holmes

The Return of Sherlock Holmes is special for all the Sherlock Holmes's fans because when everyone presumed him dead, he returns in this book and continues his legacy detective work along with John Watson accompanying him and writing about his work.

This book contains 13 short stories of Sherlock's exceptional detective work. Sherlock is unequivocally my favourite fictional character and it is absolutely thrilling and interesting to read what Sir Arthur Conan Doyle has written almost a century ago. Sir Arthur has been a literary genius to pen those clever cases of crime and Sherlock's solutions to all of them.

An absolute delight for a Sherlock Holmes fans!

I had to go and pick "The Sentence is Death" after reading "The Word is Murder". It was simply irresistible. I think I've recently developed a love for Anthony Horowitz's writing and it is about time when I buy his "Magpie Murders".

This book is second to the Hawthorne detective series. If you've read the "The Word is Murder", this book might make a little more sense from an angle of character development for the main characters but on an overall level, this book is fine to be read as a standalone. This book deals with another case of a celebrity-lawyer, Richard Pryce's murder and Daniel Hawthorne is hired as a consultant to the Police to solve the murder mystery. Anthony Horowitz is being requested by Daniel to write a book about him solving this case again to which Anthony reluctantly agrees again and in order to accomplish this, he accompanies Hawthorne everywhere. There is an accident involved which happened 6 years before Richard's death which interlinks with the current murder investigation and it is an absolute charm to read this mystery "masterpiece" to see how everything is revealed.

This book has everything you look for in a murder mystery and I love the camaraderie between Anthony and Hawthorne. The perfect murder mystery where every character looks like a prime suspect until you move to the next. There have been so many clues dropped at times but you realize it later when you jot them down.

Thank you Anthony for giving us such a thriller with a few bouts of laughter!

Sometimes I surprise myself when I make good decisions and picking this book up someone left at the "romance" section is definitely one of those decisions. The cover of the book fascinated me and I couldn't resist. "The Word Is Murder" is one such book which is not "much" hyped up on instagram and I wonder why.

The book starts with the lady, Diana Cowper, going to a funeral parlour and booking her own funeral She is murdered the same evening. Coincident? Daniel Hawthorne, an ex-Policeman who is mysterious in his own ways but very efficient. He is being hired as a consultant by Police to solve the murder case of Diana Cowper. Daniel approaches Anthony, a famous writer, to write about the case he's solving so he must accompany him everywhere. A concept of "Sherlock Holmes" and "Watson"? pretty much.

Diana's son, Damian Cowper, is a famous celebrity star living in LA and he visits London for his mother's funeral. He also gets killed brutally shortly after her funeral. Hawthorne has now 2 murders to solve. Anthony has to write a book with Hawthorne being chippy and mysterious and not giving away too many details about himself. So, how the murders are investigated, how they are solved and how they are documented in the book "The Word Is Murder" - you must read this to know!

Anthony Horowitz didn't only write this book, he is in the book and narrated the whole story in the first-person narrative. The English background of the book and the use of British vocabulary also piqued my interest. A clever, brilliant and unputdownable book which I recommend to all the book lovers who love murder mysteries.

It was my first book from Anthony Horowitz and he is "bloody" brilliant at what he is writing. I am definitely looking forward to read more of his books!