This week’s book is a very controversial one! Agatha Christie herself said this was her least favorite, but some readers really seem to like it! This one is The Mystery of the Blue Train, published in 1928.
Original Book
I’ve heard several different opinions of this book. Many people do not enjoy it because of the way Christie uses her characters. I kept that in mind while reading, but also wanted to come to my own conclusions, so I kept an open mind. In trying to keep an open mind, I came to enjoy the book! In this novel, a woman named Ruth Kettering is traveling to the French Riviera on a luxury train known as The Blue Train with a famous ruby given to her by her wealthy father. She recently planned to divorce her husband, and was leaving her father to take care of the act for her. There were several people traveling on the train along with her, including her maid, her husband, Derek Kettering, and his lover, Mirelle. Also on the Blue Train is Katherine Grey, an unmarried woman who’s recently come into money. (It’s fun to note that this is the first mention of St. Mary Mead, the village Agatha Christie’s other beloved sleuth Miss Marple is from!) While the train is in, France, Mrs. Kettering is found strangled, with her face severely disfigured and her ruby missing. There are many people connected to her or family that are traveling on the train as well, so any one of them could have been the killer. Luckily, Hercule Poirot is also on board and is conscripted by the local policeman in France to find the killer. The overall story is very engaging. However, it is my personal opinion that there were too many people in this story and that Christie doesn’t use them as well as she could. The idea of a murder on a train with a large, sprawing cast of characters is something she would go on to use in Murder on the Orient Express, where she is more mature as a writer and the idea is better used. Even though this wasn’t one of her best novels in the Poirot cannon, there were some themes that emerged throughout that caught my attention
- Underestimating the People Around You – There are MANY examples of underestimation in this book, with some characters even commenting on it. It begins with the murdered woman, Ruth Kettering, being underestimated by her father. The theme of subverting expectations is common throughout Christie’s novels, but this is one of the first novels in the Poirot cannon that mentions it within the novel itself. I’ll have to read and see if this continues as I continue to read.
- Marriage – I was near to saying that dissolution of marriage was a theme in this novel, but there are some examples of happy marriages, both expected and unexpected, in this novel. The marriages in the novel, both good and bad, are critical to moving the plot forward. After doing some research, I discovered this was the novel Christie wrote when her husband Archie Christie was in the process of divorcing her. So it’s fair to assume that Christie was not entirely happy with marriage at the time, and could’ve been working out her own issues with marriage through her work.
David Suchet TV Version
This is one of the rare times I liked the TV adaptation more than the book itself! There were many wonderful places actors and actresses who seemed perfectly cast and really understood the character they were playing. (Also so much fun to see Ross and Monica’s dad from Friends the TV show as Mr. Van Aldin, Ruth’s American millionaire father!) The screenwriters who adapted the story from the book succeeded in connecting the storylines where Christie herself was lacking. This one is definitely worth a watch, because the story is interesting and will keep you engaged!
Final Thoughts
This is my least favorite Poirot novel so far, but it was not hard to get through. I struggled to connect the two different plots that were occurring, but that was the only difficulty I had. I would not recommend this novel to a newcomer to Christie, but if you enjoy the character of Poirot, then you should enjoy this one. It’s not as bad as most people (even Agatha Christie herself!) say.
My Current Ranking
- The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
- The Mysterious Affair at Styles
- Poirot Investigates
- The Big Four
- The Murder on the Links
- The Mystery of the Blue Train
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