And then there were none

I felt like I should have been drinking a cup of hot tea while listening to Bing Crosby as I read this novel. Agatha Christie published the world’s best-selling mystery novel in 1939. And Then There Were None tells the story of ten strangers who were lured onto Soldier Island, an isolated rock of the Devon Coast by a man named U. N. Owen. The party was cut off from the mainland, with their generous host mysteriously absent and were each accused of a terrible crime. Then one of the party dies suddenly, and they realise there may be a murder in their midst who might strike again and again. The story picks up when Anthony Marston is poisoned. Suspicions didn’t begin to creep in until after the third murder, which resulted from a blow to the head. I was worried about following along with ten characters and keeping their stories straight, but Christie managed to create compelling characters with fascinating background stories. Emily Brent, the ultra-religious spinster, should have had more spotlight in the story—and a spin-off too. She intrigued me the most. Emily fired her pregnant, unmarried maid who committed suicide right after. Emily was rigid, harsh, and probably twitchy. She made an excellent candidate as the murderer. But was it her? And all the time, copies of a macabre nursery rhyme hung in each room, a nursery rhyme with an omen of death for all of them. While the nursery rhyme, Ten Little Soldiers, is the biggest plot theme, there’s another underlying theme: all ten people were complicit in the murders of other people. Dr Armstrong was responsible for the death of his patient. Vera Claythorne was accused of killing a child. Philip Lombard had no remorse for killing several East African tribesmen. While each person had a different background story, there was always the same conclusion: no justice had been served for their actions. What were they really doing on
Soldier Island? A common occurrence when reading books considered to be classic novel is, they can be drawn out and overly descriptive. “And Then There Were None” is nothing like that and in my opinion the perfect length for a simple
murder mystery novel. Just shy of 240 pages this book is easy to read, direct and easily keeps the reader engaged. It’s the perfect book for someone looking for a mentally stimulating yet quick read. Especially if you’re going on vacation Nothing is more frustrating than reading a murder mystery novel and never truly getting the answers to all your questions by the end. “And Then There Were None” fulfils the need for answers perfectly by the end. Throughout the book, the reader is full of questions and given a little, barely perceptible clue/ answers but by the end, Christie pulls it together in a casual way that answers everything without being completely outrageous. Some cons were that there were too many characters to keep track of. Multiple perspectives are almost crucial to writing a novel of this calibre for it enhances the air of suspicion amongst characters. With that in mind, it is very easy in my opinion to slur together perspectives and voices of characters making it hard to differentiate between people while reading. In conclusion, And then there were none is a fast-paced who-done-it novel, in which you will expect nothing until the end. And Then There Were None is a grim but riveting mystery. Characters are first introduced just so that readers can distinguish them, but as the book progresses and readers get further inside their minds and their fears, the suspense builds. One of the darkest aspects of the novel is the fact there’s no “good guy” here — all of the characters appear equally guilty in more ways than one. This is an exciting book — however grisly — that is to be enjoyed for its page turning plot and Christie’s masterful construction around the spooky nursery rhyme.