Published in 1975, and supposedly written about 35 years earlier, which puts it at the beginning of World War II, apparently during the blitz.

I have read this before, when I was reading the Agatha Christie Reading Challenge. Now I have re-read it for my U3A Agatha Christie Reading Group. However we intend to keep up our reading and discussion next year.

Nearing the end of his life Hercule Poirot has discovered 5 murders where he believes innocent people have borne the responsibility but at someone else's design. He calls this person X. The place where he met Hastings so many years ago, Styles, has now become a guest house, and one of the people now staying there is X. Poirot realises that X will never be tried in a court of law and he is determined that he will deal with X himself. He wants Hastings to be his eyes and ears because he himself is crippled with arthritis, and prone to heart attacks, and in a wheel chair.

But Poirot understands the dangers to both Hastings and himself, as well as Hastings' daughter Judith who is also living at Styles.

This novel is a very fitting tribute to Poirot, obviously written while Christie was still enamoured with him, and not yet ready to kill him off. ( )

Read it in one evening. So... I thought the eventually revealed backstory regarding the villain Poirot was seeking was rather fanciful and far-fetched ... but then, wow was that whole concluding section effective! ( )

Norton's best skill is manipulating people to murder others. His final act is to manipulate Poirot into murdering him. ( )

A revolving bookcase in an Innovations catalogue* brought be back to the final Poirot novel, but written many years (30ish) earlier so it's chronologically more aligned to her pre war novels. On this reading I found it a little unengaging, but that may've been me. The plot takes us back to where Poirot began, the house Styles, where he is staying, a physically broken man, and where he has invited his faithful friend Hastings, to help prevent a murder. So an oddity in many ways but a completion of the Poirot story. *To say more would be a spoiler!

Classic Agatha Christie, with twists and turns you don't expect, but still the ending isn't totally a surprise because at least once or more, you anticipated who was the killer. In this case, there is a surprise twist at the end. I don't know if I've just read so much of her work that I can anticipate her, or if the clues were obvious, or maybe I read this before (I don't remember this one) and subconsciously remembered at least part of the ending. Overall, a fun, quick read, ideal for a time when you don't want to have to think too hard. The characters are standard archetypes and that makes it even more enjoyable since it usually isn't the archetype you would most expect that commits the murder. ( )