Death in the Clouds

Did I purposely read this on a plane? Absolutely. My experience flying economy class down the west coast and then across the Pacific was much different than a 1930s jaunt across the English Channel, but the experience was delightful nonetheless.

When a wealthy businesswoman is found dead at the end of a flight, it's the ultimate, ultimate locked-room mystery. Hercule Poirot is endlessly amused when he finds himself the prime suspect after the apparent murder weapon is found near his seat. But no matter how many tricks Madame Christie plays, she'll never make her funny little Belgian detective the murderer. So, it must be one of the other nine passengers: two society ladies, a beauty shop girl, a banker, a dentist, a doctor, father and show more son archaeologists, or...a mystery author who has done research on the murder weapon in question. (Of course, he can't be the murderer, either. He's just there to poke fun at the craft.)

Mr. Clancy rocked gently back in his chair.
"You know," he said, "I begin to think this murder is going to be a really fortunate thing for me. I'm writing the whole thing exactly as it happened--only as fiction, course, and I shall call it 'The Air Mail Mystery.' Perfect pen portraits of the passengers. It ought to sell like wild fire, if only I can get it out in time."
"Won't you be had up for libel, or something?" asked Jane.
Mr. Clancy turned a beaming face upon her.
"No, no, my dear lady. Of course, if I were to make one of the passengers the murderer--well, then, I might be liable for damages. But that is the strong part of it all--an entirely unexpected solution is revealed in the last chapter."
Poirot leaned forward eagerly.
"And that solution is?"
Again Mr. Clancy chuckled.
"Ingenious," he said. "Ingenious and sensational. Disguised as the pilot, a girl gets into the plane at Le Bourget and successfully stows herself away under Madame Giselle's seat. She has with her an ampul of the newest gas. She releases this, everybody becomes unconscious for three minutes, she squirms out, fires the [murder weapon], and makes a parachute descent from the rear door of the car."
Both Jane and Poirot blinked.

Christie also can't resist playing matchmaker and watching Poirot be charmed by young love.

The promised dinner and theater...had duly come off. It was one of those enchanting evenings when every word and confidence exchanged seemed to reveal a bond of sympathy and shared tastes.
They liked dogs and disliked cats. They both hated oysters and loved smoked salmon. They like Greta Garbo and disliked Katharine Hepburn. They didn't like fat women and admired really jet-black hair. They disliked very red nails. They disliked loud voices, and noisy restaurants. They preferred busses to tubes.
It seemed almost miraculous that two people should have so many points of agreement.

(Obviously, these cat- & Kat-hating jerks deserve each other, although I'm with them on the oysters and noisy restaurants.)

Solution: Of course, it's one of the young lovers! The dentist (Norman Gale) killed Madame Giselle, so her long-lost daughter (his wife) would inherit her money. He went to the bathroom, disguised himself as a steward and stuck a dart in her neck. The daughter/wife being on the plane (as a lady's maid) was an unexpected complication, as was falling in love with Jane. These led to him killing his wife in an attempt to cover his tracks and win both love and money. But never underestimate M. Poirot's little grey matter. Murder solved and Jane sent off with the sweet archaelogist son. show less

Ahora que he estado leyendo tan seguido los libros de Agatha y además en orden me he dado cuenta de que es notable el estado de animo que posiblemente tenía la escritora cuando escribía sus libros, mientras en algunos el ambiente es jocoso, divertido o ligero, en otros es serio y formal o como en este caso incluso algo opresivo, había leído libros de ella antes de empezar con este reto de Agatha, pero ni los había leído en orden y ni los había leído todos, claro me faltaban un montón, pero me ha encantado darme cuenta de estos cambios en la ambiente de sus historias.
Este libro es una chulada, veamos, el asesinato, es super ingenioso, no solo donde se perpetra si no el como y el con qué, no puedo, por mucho que lo intenté show more imaginarme a esta mujer ideando estas cosas, debía ser un proceso fascinante verla concibiendo sus asesinatos, ya sabemos que la señora era la reina de los venenos, así que aunque muy interesante no me sorprende, lo que si que sorprende es como hace llegar dichos venenos a sus víctimas, luego pasas por darte cuenta que le da sus giros para que resulte todavía más intrincado e ingenioso dicho asesinato.
Luego tenemos que por primera vez nuestro buen Hércules Poirot es sospechoso de dicho asesinato, lo cual es grandioso y además divertido de ver.
Y para terminar tenemos al asesino, mi buena Agatha ¡me ha engañado otra vez!, que nunca, ni siquiera por casualidad sospeché de quien terminó siendo, así que, también he terminado el libro con ganas de dar un aplauso de pie a la ingeniosidad, inteligencia y mordacidad que tenía esta mujer.
Como he dicho en este libro el ambiente es diferente a como lo he sentido en otros, no sé, incluso leyéndolo llegue a pensar que tal vez nuestra buena Agatha estuviera pasando por momentos no muy felices en su vida mientras lo escribía, no hay por ningún lado ese sentido de humor que se ve en otras entregas e incluso nuestro buen Poirot está mucho más serio que de costumbre.
Este libro junto con el Asesinato de Roger Ackroyd, Diez negritos y cinco cerditos esta en el top de mis favoritos de está escritora. show less

This is a very classic Poirot, and it's safe to say that I enjoy those the most. The locked room is an airplane going from Paris to London and Poirot is a passenger. One of the other passengers is murdered and of course everyone on the plane is a suspect - including Poirot himself! It's a very methodical novel and Poirot at its best. While I guessed a small part of the solution, I did not guess the culprit and I loved the solving of the case.
It was also very interesting to read about air travel in the 1930s, which made me enjoy the novel even more (although there still is racism and also sexism in this text and it's not ok).

So... I didn't work out who was the culprit, but I did work out *quite* early on that there was a very important character missing from the discussions of whodunnit. No one was ever mentioning this person, and it didn't take a detective to deduce that this person had another identity that would prove to be very important indeed.
I'm not used to a gap that glaring from Agatha Christie... usually she covers all bases and doesn't give you room to think she's skipping anything. But I'll allow it, seeing as how it wasn't actually the culprit. :) (But was still part of the solution.)

One of my favorite aspects of this Poirot adventure is the way Christie writes the first fourth or so of it, particularly the parts where she goes inside each of the passengers minds as they are getting ready to take off and in the air. Christie has SUCH a sharp way of capturing humans and their habits in even just a couple of sentences and I just love how she winds together all their crossing paths and motivations.
The plot gets a touch laggy around the halfway point, but nothing too bad. There are plenty of red herrings in here, too; it's so enjoyable to poke at them and follow my own little trains of thoughts to see what I can come up with! It may not always be the right answer but it's fun either way.

When Hercule Poirot travels back to England from France by plane, his stomach is giving him so much grief that he promptly misses a murder committed almost right under his nose; however, once it is discovered, he inevitably takes charge. Clearly the murderer must be one of the passengers or stewards – but who? Everyone on board denies knowing the Frenchwoman, a known Parisian moneylender. Readers can be reassured that once again Poirot employs order and method in exercising his little grey cells and uncovers the truth.

I thought that only Agatha Christie could come up with a locked-room murder set on an aeroplane. While it has all the usual ingredients of a Poirot murder mystery, I was able to discover the who, later most of the how show more and finally the why by using my own method of deduction, i.e. reading carefully and knowing Dame Agatha's own modus operandi. Still a lot of fun and a good brain teaser, though, even if the characters don't have a lot of psychological depth to them.

Please note: there are a couple of incidences of casual racism and sexism in the novel. show less

Dame Agatha scores again with this high-altitude locked-room mystery, wherein Hercule Poirot is present but sleeping when a woman is murdered aboard an airplane flying from France to England. I enjoyed all the twists and turns, even though (unusually for me) I actually sussed out the killer quite early on, thanks to the author playing fair with the clues. But even though I was pretty sure I knew WHOdunit, I was foggy on both the HOWdunit and WHYdunit, and in both cases was not disappointed by the reveal.