I have been an avid Agatha Christie fan for 43 years. I first fell in love with her classic mysteries when I bought a box set of Hercule Poirot books at a garage sale. I spent an entire summer sneaking away to my room to read all about little grey cells and waxed moustaches. Flash forward to present time, and this year I decided to go on a reading journey through all of Christie's mystery writing in publication order. At times I have made mistakes and had to backtrack slightly. Christie often published short stories in magazines and then later collected them into story collections at a later date.

Only after finishing Christie's first novel featuring Miss Marple (published in 1930) did I discover that the first Marple short stories were published in 1927 and then later released in book form (The Thirteen Problems/The Tuesday Club Murders) in 1932. Backtrack! :)

The Tuesday Night Club is the first appearance of Miss Marple. She joins a group of five friends who propose to form a club that looks at old, unsolved police cases. Being of varied professions and life experiences, they want to ascertain which of them is best at discovering the truth. The story is short, but interesting. The other members of the club seem to discount Jane Marple because a spinster can't possibly understand life and human nature as well as people more accustomed to the world can....right?? *Smile*

This story is nearly 100 years old. But it's still a fun bit of sleuthing and a great introduction to one of Christie's most classic characters. There were some things I had to look up -- language and references change a lot in 93 years! So I did a bit of sleuthing on my own!

Corn-flour. Christie mentions a sick woman who asked for a bowl of corn-flour because she is feeling bad. It refers to it as a drink, not prepared like hot cereal or grits. The internet is a lovely thing and I discovered the nature of this "bowl of corn-flour'' pretty quickly. It's basically milk, sugar, spices, and vanilla thickened with corn flour. I can see how this would be soothing to someone with an upset stomach. And it sounds very similar to Mexican Atole. Here's a recipe link:

https://www.goya.com/en/recipes/mexican-style-atole

Banting. At one point the woman who feels ill tells her cook to drink the corn-flour as she doesn't approve of the cook "banting" to lose weight. Banting? Once again I turned to the internet. William Banting was a undertaker....and he struggled with his weight. So, at the urging of his physician, he went on a diet -- low carb, low sugar, high fat. It worked well and he lost his extra weight. So then he wrote a popular pamphlet on his diet plan....and his name became synonymous with dieting...particularly low carb diets. Doesn't his plan sound familar??? ha ha. And we all thought Keto was something new.....it's just banting done over 2000's style. The diabetic diet with some added facets...rebranded. Just think what William Banting could have done if Pinterest existed way back then! :)

Hundreds and thousands. This was a cooking reference. I was like hmmmmmm.....another UK/US English conundrum. This one was easy though -- one quick internet search. Hundreds and thousands are.....cupcake sprinkles!

Lovely story! Definitely a fun read and a nice intro for one of my favorite amateur sleuths! And I got to do a bit of internet ferreting as well. Lots of fun packed into a short 16 page story!

I actually own a hardback copy of Miss Marple: The Complete Short Stories (Putnam, 1985), but I'm going to review these short stories one at a time because I do background research on each one. I did the same thing when I read through the first Hercule Poirot stories....so much fun!

On to the next -- The Idol House of Astarte! ( )