The Mysterious Affair at Styles.

A great house in wartime England, a dead heiress, a locked bedroom, and a refugee detective who trusts his little grey cells above all else. This is where it all began.

What it's about

Recovering from the front, Captain Hastings visits Styles Court and finds the household seething with tension beneath its comfortable surface. When the mistress of the house, recently and controversially remarried, dies in agony one night, the door bolted from within, suspicion touches nearly everyone under the roof. By chance Hastings has an old acquaintance nearby, a fastidious Belgian named Hercule Poirot, who agrees to investigate. Agatha Christie lays out her clues with scrupulous fairness, from the scattered evidence in the sickroom to the small inconsistencies no one else thinks to weigh.

Themes

Beneath the puzzle lies a study of a world unsettled by war, of inheritance and money and the quiet resentments of family life. Christie is interested in how respectable surfaces conceal motive, and in the discipline of paying attention. Order disturbed and then painstakingly restored is the deep rhythm of the book.

Why it still matters

This is the launch of one of fiction's most beloved detectives and of a career that would make Christie the best-selling novelist of all time. The classic country-house mystery, with its closed circle of suspects and its final drawing-room revelation, is essentially defined here. To read it is to watch a whole genre find its footing.

Who it's for

Newcomers to Christie who want to meet Poirot at the source, and devoted fans curious about his first case. Anyone who enjoys a fair-play puzzle, an English country setting, and a detective who is always three steps ahead will feel right at home.

Sources and references

Verified references for this edition: Open Library, WorldCat, Agatha Christie on Wikipedia.