⛰ What It's About
An elderly wealthy woman, who catered for the famous Belgian detective Hercule Poirot as a war refugee and invited Hastings to stay at her place (Styles court), gets murdered in her own bedroom by poison after being warned in advance. Many of her household are suspected: her stepsons who look forward to her death in order to inherit all her fortune, her much younger recent husband who also wants to inherit her fortune, her her lifelong friend and her protégé.
🧠 Thoughts
Surprisingly enough, Christie's first book was The Mysterious Affair at Styles (1920) which featured Hercule Poirot, the famous Belgian detective, and his friend Colonel Hastings. So, why's that surprising, you ask? Because the book is so good from my POV and I didn't notice a difference in Christie's style between that book and the following ones. I have to say that I expected her writing style to be a little different and I also expected Poirot's character to be a bit off given that this is her first book. However, it turns out that I was absolutely wrong!
The book is a puzzle mystery which means that it's that kind of a book that the reader tries to guess the culprit before it's announced. Almost all clues that are necessary to solve the crime are given and the reader can have a hunch about the culprit using these clues and this is something I absolutely liked about that book.
The book's a lot like Christie's Death on the Nile and you'll probably know what I mean when you read the book.
Characters
I decided to make a small mind map for the characters of each book I read because I find myself lost in the middle of the book and not able to recall who is who. So here you go:
TV Adaptation
The Mysterious Affair at Styles episode is season 3's first episode of Agatha Christie's Poirot TV series, and it's surprising enough that they didn't start the TV series with Christie's first book; quite strange! However, what I find great about this episode in particular is that it stayed true to the book and no changes were made to the plot as opposed to some other episodes of the series. Given the time constrain of the episode, only one character (Dr. Bauerstein) was left out beside several clues (the gardeners who witnessed the will, the extra coffee cup that Lawrence was asked to search for, the letter to Evie from Mrs. Inglethorpe, the visit to the hospital where Cynthia works). Overall, the adaptation is pretty nice compared to the book.
Thoughts about the Plot (Spoilers Ahead)
First off, I wanna point out that the plot is pretty similar to that of Death on the Nile. The two novels have two lovers who trick a richer person by expressing love to him. In both novels, the manipulated rich person was a woman: in The Mysterious Affair at Styles it was Emily Inglethorp, and in Death on the Nile it was Linnet Doyle. The deceptive couple managed to murder the rich woman in both books with the intent to inherit her money and flee. Another similarity between the two novels is that the murderers were exposed because of the men not women; Alfred Inglethorp exposed himself by writing that stupid letter to his cousin aka lover, and Simon Doyle exposed himself when Poirot confronted him with facts.
Second, as mentioned above, the reader can have a hunch about the murderer given all the clues. However, the clue of the sleeping bromide powder represents the crux of the novel and it isn't easy for a layman to make that connection between bromide powder and strychnine unless the reader's a chemist.
Third, the idea of the letter that Mr. Inglethorp wrote to Mrs. Howard. For real, man?! That's the stupidest thing any murderer can do. And he even acted more stupid by placing the letter in his desk drawer because he couldn't send it at that time. Is it logical to leave something that important in the desk drawer so that it can be found by anyone? I think that letter was a bit too convenient for Christie to provide evidence, and I think it shouldn't have been this way.
Fourth, I think that Christie's personal life inspired her to write this novel this way. Let me explain: this novel has a great deal of it talking about poisons and whatnot. This has something to do with Christie's life because she served in hospital dispensaries, acquiring a thorough knowledge of poisons which she used in many of her books, especially The Mysterious Affair at Styles which has one of the characters, called Cynthia, also working in a dispensary and knowledgeable about poisons.
Christie as a nurse in WW1
Conclusion
The book is good especially when you know that it's Christie's first book. It's also a puzzle mystery that you can almost solve on your own given the clues which makes this book interesting. However, there are some stuff that you'd find illogical in the plot, but that's not a big problem. All in all, if you're a true Agatha Christie fan, you definitely should read her first book which launched Poirot's career.
