Book Review: The Monogram Murders

An Agatha Christie book written by someone else. All my spidey sense are tingling. The Monogram Murders by Sophie Hannah.

Basic Summary (Courtesy of KCLS):

Hercule Poirot’s quiet supper in a London coffee house is interrupted when a young woman confides to him that she is about to be murdered. She is terrified, but begs Poirot not to find and punish her killer. Once she is dead, she insists, justice will have been done. Later that night, Poirot learns that three guests at a fashionable London hotel have been murdered, and a cuff link has been placed in each one’s mouth. Could there be a connection with the frightened woman? While Poirot struggles to put together the bizarre pieces of the puzzle, the murderer prepares another hotel bedroom for a fourth victim.

My thoughts:

I am beyond torn on this one. I want to complain. There are so many issues. The Poirot in this book speaks French, he talks about his little grey cells, but he is not Poirot.

“I would know the difference with my eyes closed.” A line oft repeated in the novel. And the difference is there. This is not Poirot, it’s a detective in a Poirot suit. A third rate bit player in a detective suit in a Poirot suit.

And the real rub?

The book doesn’t need Poirot. It is delightfully torturous. A beautiful murder mystery from start to finish. The plot sets trap after trap in a way that had me patting myself on the back so hard that I managed to catch that trap, I didn’t see I had already fallen into another one. Which way am I digging? Out? Or further down the wrong path?

I get the cache a Poirot mystery brings. And in the book market today, you need everything leg up you can get. But calling this a Poirot mystery detracts from the brilliant work it actually would be with any other detective leading the charge. Lucky for me I am good at pretending she wasn’t talking about Agatha Christie’s Poirot.

Side Note: I was so absorbed in this book, I got burned lobster red on vacation.