Fiction Fans

Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie

• Episode 183

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Your hosts discuss Murder on the Orient Express, a reread chosen for them by their Patreon supporters as part of the quarterly “Patron’s Choice” selection. They debate whether or not it’s mean to describe a fictional character as “ugly”, talk about racism in the 1930s and in Christie’s work, and chat about the experience of knowing the ending because you’re rereading vs having the ending spoiled for you on a first time read.


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Thanks to the following musicians for the use of their songs:

- Amarià for the use of “Sérénade à Notre Dame de Paris”
- Josh Woodward for the use of “Electric Sunrise”

Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License


Lilly:

Hello and welcome to Fiction Fans, a podcast where we read books and other words too. I'm Lily.

Sara:

And I'm Sarah. And today our patrons over on Patreon have chosen murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie. For us to read for this episode,

Lilly:

And this is a reread for both of us, which I think is gonna be extra interesting with it being, you know, a murder mystery.

Sara:

I will say yes, technically, I think it's a reread for me, but it's been so long that I didn't actually remember anything.

Lilly:

Well, before we get into that, our quick five minute intro, starting with what's something great that happened recently,

Sara:

It rained today which was lovely. I love a nice rainy day. Even though I did have to work and couldn't just, you know, cuddle up on the couch with the pugs.

Lilly:

still nice. Good vibes though.

Sara:

It's still nice.

Lilly:

Did I? I don't know if I've actually said this on the podcast yet, but I made some chocolate chip cookies. Did I say that?

Sara:

I don't think you've told anyone.

Lilly:

Well.

Sara:

haven't told me about your chocolate chip

Lilly:

I made chocolate chip cookies. That's, it's a classic. And I haven't made them in a long time. And I was like, shit, these are really good. Why don't I do this more often?

Sara:

Did you make them from scratch or did you get dough and just plop'em on a board?

Lilly:

I made them from scratch and I used bean water instead of eggs.

Sara:

Oh,

Lilly:

I made the bean water myself too. They were, it was pinto beans.

Sara:

I will say bean water. I, I know what it is. It's a, a perfectly innocuous phrase, but it just somehow sounds terrible.

Lilly:

Yeah, I know aquafaba is the fancy word, but like, nah, it's bean water.

Sara:

It's bean water.

Lilly:

It was just a fun experiment and yeah, they turned out really ugly, but delicious, so that's fine.

Sara:

What you'll have to do is make some with eggs to compare

Lilly:

I mean, I've used this recipe before. I, I just took a recipe and did like a one-to-one eggs to bean water. I didn't like find a recipe that uses bean water,

Sara:

right.

Lilly:

but it turned out okay. What are you drinking tonight? I almost forgot what our questions are.

Sara:

We have them on our notes document right here.

Lilly:

I was staring at it going, oh no,

Sara:

I don't have any cognac in the house. So I am drinking whiskey

Lilly:

lovely

Sara:

close enough.

Lilly:

is, oh, because they have cognac. Uh

Sara:

Mrs. Hubbard, the old American

Lilly:

mm-hmm.

Sara:

Is given cognac to. Staunch your nerves basically at one point in the book. I think that's the only time when it shows up.

Lilly:

Yeah, she's also given coffee at one point. She has several pretty awful things happen to her. I mean, she's fine, but just like. Scary stuff. Not dangerous, but scary. And so she's constantly being given beverages to help deal with that. And I'm not drinking coffee because it is like 7:00 PM and that's crazy.

Sara:

It's a little late for coffee. I mean, you could have had decaf.

Lilly:

I could've but I decided instead to make myself some hot chocolate because also, I don't know, I think it just fits. With this book, like you said, I mean, it's been rainy here too. The book takes place like in a very snowy setting which is important for plot reasons, and so it just felt like a warm, comfortable, cozy beverage was

Sara:

It feels like it feels like the right kind of beverage for a cold, snowy train ride Eastern Europe.

Lilly:

Now that being said, a hot totty wouldn't go amiss, but have those ingredients. So hot chocolate. It is,

Sara:

Alas, but hot chocolate is still lovely.

Lilly:

it's Have you done any extracurricular reading lately? I.

Sara:

I had a dream that I was reading my Tolkien scholarship book. Does that count?

Lilly:

Oh no, that's how much you've been neglecting that reading.

Sara:

It. Yeah. We have had to do quite a bit of podcast reading because I'm gonna go on vacation. And we are not going to podcast while I'm on vacation. And so I've just been doing podcast books.

Lilly:

That's reasonable. I said out loud that I really ought to start reading our sost submissions. So that's almost the same thing as reading them.

Sara:

I haven't started reading those either.

Lilly:

Yeah. But I'm excited. I'm looking forward to it. I'm, it's always really interesting to see like what people do, what they send in, so.

Sara:

Agreed,

Lilly:

Okay. Agatha Christie, the Queen of Crime,

Sara:

yes.

Lilly:

a title that she fucking earned, I gotta say.

Sara:

I mean, she does have quite a, quite a few number of crime novels out.

Lilly:

And not just that, but she like really cemented the genre conventions as we know them.

Sara:

Yeah. I am sure that I've read quite a bit of Christie, but most of it was when I was like 10 years old. So it's been a while and it, was fun to come back to this as an adult. And I, would like to read more Christie, because I had a good time with this book. Some of it was a little I mean, there's some casual racism in the book that is, yes. It's a product of the time. I mean, this book was published in 1934, but it's still. You know,

Lilly:

It was still there. I

Sara:

it's still racist.

Lilly:

I found that while there were characters in the book making racist assumptions, Poirot, our main character tended to push back on them. I mean, not like. Holy shit, dude. That's racist. Why would you say that? But more of a, Hmm. Well, we'll see if that assumption ends up bearing out. And then he's right.'cause it like it was wrong all along. And so I thought that was an interesting way of just like a subtle kind of, Hey, your gut reaction to people is not rooted. In fact, like, do not make these jumps to assumption. Wait. Do not make, do not jump to these conclusions just because you think someone is gonna be a certain way because of where they're from.

Sara:

Yeah, I mean he, he is very careful to. Pushback on some of that stereotyping, but in a way that made me feel like it was less about the stereotype and more about the individual person. Like he wasn't necessarily saying you are making racist assumptions. He was saying, well, the circumstances of this don't actually bear out that. What you think happened?

Lilly:

He wasn't pushing back on the racism, he was pushing back on making assumptions, period.

Sara:

Yes,

Lilly:

But it at least positioned them in the book so that it didn't feel like we were going into this, just reading like really shortsighted, rude comment after shortsighted rude comment. You know, it made it, it made it feel a little better.

Sara:

I mean, it, it was not so bad that I hated every second of it.

Lilly:

Yeah.

Sara:

Of the book that is partly for the things that we've just discussed and your point precisely. But it was there.

Lilly:

It was definitely noticeable. There were also some very funny stereotypes'cause she also goes after the British quite a bit, how they are so bland and boring.

Sara:

Yeah, she kind of goes after everyone except Belgians.

Lilly:

Except Belgians, which I mean, well, Pau of course isn't going to insult his own people.

Sara:

No, never.

Lilly:

I really loved the way she did French accents in this though,'cause she didn't do it phonetically. She did it with like sentence structure. So you could tell someone was speaking in a French accent because of the way that their words were ordered and not just like throwing in silly letters.

Sara:

I was gonna push back on your definition of that being an accent, but I actually agree with you there. But I'm pretty sure that it felt realistic because I think she knew French, which was the impression that I got from the book. And then looking at her Wikipedia page, it says that she did get some education in Paris. So like, yeah, she spoke French.

Lilly:

Was it all of the actual French in the book that gave it away?

Sara:

no, no, that couldn't have been it.

Lilly:

I mean, and it wasn't to the point where I think if you didn't speak Fri, I mean, I don't speak French, but I can like recognize things in context. I can figure it out, but I think if I didn't have that, it would still make sense. It's more just like little exclamations sort of peppered throughout. Mm-hmm.

Sara:

I, I'm not gonna say I'm fluent in French. I'm not fluent in French, but I'm certainly conversational. And like I could read all of the French that was included in this because it's pretty basic. And I know that you did study French, but I'm not sure how like much you've retained. So I was just wondering what that experience was like for you.

Lilly:

I mean, I think I figured out all of the dialogue from this book. I. I'm not conversational. I can order at a restaurant, like I can like brute force my way through. I'm sure my grammar is terrible. I can communicate but not elegantly, you know what I

Sara:

Right. Yeah.

Lilly:

So I probably, or I know for a fact that if I would've been given all of those sentences in English and told translate this into French, it would've been a fucking disaster. But seeing in them in French, I had enough vocabulary and enough context clues that I could go, oh, okay. That's something to the effect of why I never, or something like that.

Sara:

Right, and I do think that it's small enough that if you didn't speak any French, you would just, you know, skip over it and you'd be

Lilly:

like imagine that they're saying suck every time and then that's fine.

Sara:

Basically

Lilly:

Just they were not getting like important details for the story in those

Sara:

right. It's, it's more like character work really.

Lilly:

Mm-hmm. And it makes sense. Poirot is Belgian, he speaks French. Okay. Her descriptions of characters were absolutely bonkers. she was just calling people ugly, left and right, and it didn't even feel cruel, like it just felt very matter of fact.

Sara:

I mean, I would disagree a little bit there. It didn't feel like a statement of character. The ugly people were not the bad guys, but it definitely felt

Lilly:

I mean, it's not a nice thing to say regardless, but they're not real people, so that doesn't count.

Sara:

I mean, but it can still be a mean thing even if they're not real people.

Lilly:

it, it didn't, I feel like a lot of times when physical descriptions are so, not biased, but vehement, it's often used to tell you whether you're supposed to like a character or not. And I was very impressed that that was not the case.

Sara:

Yeah. I mean, it, it felt I'm gonna say even handed for lack of a better. Phrase because even like Poirot is described as being an ugly little man

Lilly:

Yeah, and he's our hero.

Sara:

So it, it didn't, it didn't feel like it was only being applied to the bad guys.

Lilly:

I mean, specifically I think. We'll have to have a conversation about who the bad guys are.

Sara:

well, Eaton, yes. But I, I mean in a, General sense, it didn't feel like it was being applied to bad guys. I, I mean that more as agreeing with your point that it was not telling us who we should like or not.

Lilly:

exactly.

Sara:

it does still feel kind of bad when some people are described as really ugly and some women are described as like being stunningly beautiful.

Lilly:

That is also how people work though.

Sara:

It is, but it's just, I don't know. It, it was so blunt that I wouldn't call it nice.

Lilly:

No, no. I did not say it was nice. I said it didn't feel cruel,

Sara:

Okay. it didn't feel cruel,

Lilly:

unkind, maybe

Sara:

unkind, yes.

Lilly:

Not tactful, but who, who does she have to be tactful about?

Sara:

I mean, it's, I guess it's true that these are just fake people in a fake world.

Lilly:

And I also, I wish I had like marked down which page that these descriptions were on because she didn't say, oh, that person like has asymmetrical eyebrows and that's why they're ugly and is therefore calling all people with asymmetrical eyebrows ugly. Like she, didn't.

Sara:

she did describe, the Russian princess is having a toad like face,

Lilly:

Yeah. I don't know if there's a single human being that that description is actually accurate for. That's a fake person.

Sara:

I guess it kind of, I don't know. It just, all of the descriptions felt over the top a little

Lilly:

Oh yeah, for sure. Definitely. I.

Sara:

and I think the, amount of. Ugly people contributed to that feeling.

Lilly:

She was not trying to stroke anybody's ego.

Sara:

Yeah. it's more like there were no just normal people. They were either hideous or beautiful.

Lilly:

That's true. Yeah. No neutrals

Sara:

Yeah. There were no neutrals.

Lilly:

well The novel, Poirot is savage. Near the beginning, this one character asks him to like be a bodyguard, basically, and he's like, Hmm, I don't like your face. Like straight up to this person. Absolutely wild.

Sara:

Yeah, I,

Lilly:

that was not him calling him ugly. That was him saying like, something about your face makes me think you're not nice.

Sara:

Yes, that was very specifically not him calling the character ugly. That was so blunt. I couldn't, it, it, it made me uncomfortable. Uncomfortable. I was like, plu, you can't just tell someone you don't like their face,

Lilly:

it.

Sara:

even if it's true.

Lilly:

It gives you, like, it paints such a picture of this person he is at. I mean, in this story, he is a world renowned detective. Not necessarily celebrity status, but people in that industry recognize his name and so he doesn't have to bullshit. He can just be extremely blunt and there's no consequences.'cause what are they gonna do?

Sara:

I mean, I kind of got the impression that he would have done that even if he wasn't a. Famous detective,

Lilly:

Yeah,

Sara:

like, he might not have necessarily been quite so blunt about turning down jobs, but that's just kind of the person he is. He's this, you know, middle aged or slightly older, fussy detective.

Lilly:

Very opinionated.

Sara:

And not afraid of making his opinions known.

Lilly:

No, this book had such a procedural structure. It was very fun. It has been quite a while since I've read any Agatha Christie. I've seen some adaptations recently. Kenneth Brona did a movie series.

Sara:

he in fact, did this exact

Lilly:

yes. Yes, he did. But he did it. I think there's like three of them also casting yourself as the ugly little man. Amazing power move, Kenneth. But it is really fun. Like the book is just laid out very matter of fact, like at the very beginning. Crime occurs, Poirot signs on to investigate he just goes through like, okay, I'm gonna look at the scene. I'm going to interview all of the people. and we just follow him through his detective process. And then at the end he's like, okay, I'm gonna sit here with my eyes closed for 15 minutes, exactly 15 minutes, and then I'll know the answer.

Sara:

It, it was fun. It reminded me, and I mean obviously this is intentional, because Agatha Christie is foundational to the detective genre, but it reminded me of death in Paradise. Which follows this exact same format. You know, crime occurs the detective looks at the crime scene, interviews the people, has an aha moment, calls them all together, and then explains what happened. And it, reading this book just reminded me how much shows like that, are built on what foundation Christie laid.

Lilly:

Absolutely, and it's, it's fun that it is so predictable in that way.

Sara:

Right.

Lilly:

so like the, the surprise doesn't come from what happens. The surprise comes from the mystery itself, I mean, I would argue is one of the foundational concepts of cozy mysteries, right? not that I'm calling this cozy, but that's a really important aspect of them because you're not going to be shocked by what's happening. You're gonna be surprised by the discoveries that they're baking.

Sara:

I mean, if you wanted to make an argument that the Poirot novels are cozy detective novels, I, I could see that for exactly that reason. I mean, they're, they're very formulaic. And Paro always gets this guy in the end.

Lilly:

Yeah. There was some fun tension in this because it was on the Orient Express. They're on a train of course that, I mean, this is a classic novel, right? It's, the train murder. And so there is some tension there because the murderers one of us, which I think is a also a common thing that Christie does to kind of. Raise the stakes a little bit because otherwise this book is all conversation. There is zero action.

Sara:

I mean it's, not quite a locked room mystery, but it's a locked train mystery.

Lilly:

a locked room mystery,

Sara:

It's basically,

Lilly:

Not only are they on this train, the train is stuck in a snow drift, so it is not moving. It's in the middle of nowhere. They are snowed in basically. They're on this little train car and someone gets killed, and so it's like, okay, well, not a lot of options. I thought it was really interesting how she kept the narrative tension and kept my interest and raised the stakes while still having the action on the page be very, very calm and low key.

Sara:

like you say, it is all conversation. I mean, it's all poro interviewing the people on the train and the stakes come by. The reveal that, you know, this piece of, their testimony is a lie, and this piece of their testimony is a lie. And how that reveal of information keeps the stakes from like lowering.

Lilly:

Yeah, and it's also short, right? I don't think you could drag this out into a 400 page book. I think that would get really old.

Sara:

Oh God, no.

Lilly:

But like the pacing is good and it stays fast because we're learning new information, basically every page, there's no filler. It's just. He interviews all the people. He figures out the answer. In that way, it's extremely straightforward. The mystery itself bonkers, but that is a spoiler conversation.

Sara:

We will talk about that later.

Lilly:

I think we're about there though. Who should read this book?

Sara:

If you like crime fiction or detective novels.

Lilly:

Crime fiction. And there is also, I would say, historical merit to this book. I mean, Agatha Christie in general, but this book especially, it is so well known, just reading it so that you have that cultural frame of reference I think is worth it.

Sara:

I would agree with that.

Lilly:

But also, if you like crime, yes. Aged pretty well, I'd say.

Sara:

Yeah. I mean, again, there is racism in this book just casually. But on the whole, I think it's a book that still stands up.

Lilly:

It doesn't feel antiquated or like I have to be. Interrogating it at every moment in order to like survive reading it.

Sara:

Right.

Lilly:

more of a, mm, yeah, not good. All right. It was the thirties, but yeah, I really enjoyed it.

Sara:

This episode of Fiction Fans is brought to you by fiction fans.

Lilly:

That's us. We really appreciate our patrons because otherwise we fund this podcast entirely ourselves.

Sara:

Patrons can find weekly bonus content, monthly exclusive episodes, and they have free access to our biannual zine, SIA.

Lilly:

You can find all of that and more at patreon.com/fiction fans pod. Thank you for all of your support.

Sara:

The remainder of this episode contains spoilers. Okay, so I'm not gonna lie, the whole convoluted murder plot did kind of take me out of the book because. It got to a point before the reveal where I was like, okay, everyone on this train has some connection to the dead guy. That's a little much. And then it turns out that they're all in on it. And I was like, guys, I. I get that you wanted to be a jury, but there was a much easier way of doing this. Like you didn't have to spend all of this logistical time and money and effort on it. You could have, you could have just had one person kill him. It would've been fine. He would've been just as dead.

Lilly:

Well, it was also to protect them from getting in trouble for it.

Sara:

Yeah, but they could, I'm sure they could have figured something out that would've protected them just as well.

Lilly:

Yeah, probably. I love that as a twist though, because you go into it thinking, all right, who done it? Which one of them is the murderer? And then it's. Every single one of them, every single one of them was the Murderer, like all in cahoots. That is a really fun twist on this structure that is so predictable and as a novel overall, like the plot arc, but the mystery itself is still very fun and weird.

Sara:

it is an excellent twist. I agree with you. It's a, it's a great twist, but I still think that it made life so much harder for them, like.

Lilly:

It was not realistic.

Sara:

It was, it was so silly, and they could have killed this guy like years ago probably if they weren't dead set on them all doing it.

Lilly:

I do think that them all, you know, having a history with hi, also talk about a bad guy. He was so just. Evil, like

Sara:

he was, he was just straight up bad. There were no, there was no redeeming qualities to

Lilly:

no nuance whatsoever. They're all mad because he murdered a toddler, which is pretty fair

Sara:

and got away with

Lilly:

and got away with it and had done it before. So like, there is no world in which we're going, I don't know guys, you're being pretty, reactionary about all this. Like they're

Sara:

his, his, his, death was totally justified, a hundred percent. I just think they could have done it a lot easier.

Lilly:

Well, sure. I'm glad though that they were all, you know, they all had this knowledge of him because while I was going through the book and reading it, and they're like. Oh yeah. Everyone just like Poirot doesn't like his face. Like all of these random people just decide they hate this dude. That's crazy. No, that's a lie. They have a good reason to. It's not just because they sense his vibe. That would've been crazier.

Sara:

Yes.

Lilly:

It is interesting rereading a murder mystery. It's. A very different experience and it, enjoying the experience always is such an interesting counterpoint to the concept of spoilers. I mean, obviously choosing to reread something that, you know, how it ends is different from being excited to find out how something ends and having it ruined for you. But still, like, is, does it really ruin it if you know what's gonna happen? No.

Sara:

I mean, yes, it does the first time, or it, can, because I, I do think that. Like you say, there's a difference between choosing to read something, knowing how it ends, and having something involuntarily spoiled for you. And I would argue that having something involuntarily spoiled for you absolutely ruins the experience, not because it makes the book less, but because it takes away. Your own enjoyment of being able to figure out what happened or coming to the end without having figured it out,

Lilly:

That's true. Yeah,

Sara:

and, that that's different from choosing to spoil something yourself.

Lilly:

absolutely. Yeah. I do think though that. It is fun reading books, especially mystery books when you know it, how they end. Because you're interacting with the clues differently.

Sara:

absolutely. I mean, I think there's value in reading something, knowing how it ends, like you say, because you do interact with it differently, but it still comes down to that matter of choice. You are choosing to interact with the book in that

Lilly:

yeah, absolutely. So. Did you remember? Or was

Sara:

I did not, I did not remember. I mean, the last time I read Agatha Christie, yes, I think technically this was a reread, but the last time I read Agatha Christie was like 20 or 25 years ago.

Lilly:

Fair.

Sara:

So no, I did not remember the end and I've not seen the movie. So I didn't have that like in my head either.

Lilly:

I remembered at around, I think like 30 pages in, and my coffee was 175. So

Sara:

So quite early on

Lilly:

yeah, I, like I said, I reme. I did not figure it out. I remembered very different.

Sara:

Yes. Did you then spend the intervening pages trying to see what clues Christie had left so that you could potentially figure it out?

Lilly:

Yeah, and I remembered that it was all of them, but I did not remember how it got there. You know what I mean? I like, I kind of knew that all of these people were getting revenge on a guy who sucked. That was it. That's all I had. And so, yeah, the way they worked together and they crafted their alibis, to cover for each other was like really fun seeing those puzzle pieces fit together. And then there were some things that I figured out but didn't figure out what the, like broader implications were.

Sara:

Mm-hmm.

Lilly:

So it was fun. I will admit. All of the, I'm gonna call them geography related clues were absolutely meaningless to me

Sara:

When you say geography.

Lilly:

physical layout of the space. Like, oh, well, if she was in room five and he was in room 10, then there's no way that this guy would've been walking towards her if he was leaving the room. Like none of that made it through my skull at all.

Sara:

The only one that I really cared about, and I think it's one of the main geography related clues is that the, cabin that the old American lady was in Mrs. Hubbard or. Hubert, or whatever her name was who turns out to be Linda Arden, the wife of the mother of the murdered toddler. Her cabin, because her cabin was facing one way, it meant that the lock on the door was above the doorknob. Or above where her shower bag would be hanging. And so her, like her main testimony that she couldn't see if her door was locked and had to ask someone to check it didn't hold up. And I liked that geographical clue. Everything else though, passed me by.

Lilly:

I don't understand how that works, okay. I

Sara:

I,

Lilly:

it was cool.

Sara:

I think it's just that on cars facing or rooms facing one way had the lock above and rooms facing the other way had the lock below.

Lilly:

I mean, yeah. I just don't know why they would do that, but Sure. Yes, I

Sara:

I mean, I don't, I don't either, but

Lilly:

I think her character reveal was the most exciting one.

Sara:

She is the most changed

Lilly:

yeah.

Sara:

Like it, it is the most reveal everyone else's character is the reveal is how they are related to the case. And for her, it's a reveal of who she actually is.

Lilly:

and that was really fun and exciting and she's so annoying and like kind of in a, oh honey, like pat her on the head, condescending way like. She wasn't terrible. She was just annoying throughout the book. And so to have that all be a, like a smoke screen was very cool.

Sara:

I did like that. Yeah, I do think it's kind of wild that at the end, Paro is like. So here's the actual, actual solution, but you could just tell the police that someone got on the train, stabbed him and left because ratchet was such a bad guy. And that's what they do.

Lilly:

Well, at that point, when he is announcing this, he's announcing it too. Everyone who was in on it, and his buddy who works for the train company. Oh. And the doctor was also not involved the, so there were the three people investigating. So it's not like he had to convince, you know. All of the other guys or people, men and women, that they shouldn't turn themselves in. They were probably already on board.

Sara:

he, he only had to convince his friend and the doctor, but it's still wild that like. That's what he does. That that was an option. Oh, you guys, you could just lie to the police. It's

Lilly:

Yeah. What.

Sara:

ratchet was so terrible. We're glad he's dead. These people who are justified, it's fine.

Lilly:

Taking vigilantism to a whole new level.

Sara:

Yeah, I will say that that maybe is what surprised me the most about the book.

Lilly:

Yeah. That they were like, we declare all of you the murderers and this is fine. I.

Sara:

Yes, because I knew, I mean, it's a detective novel. There's gonna be some kind of twist at the end. So I like, I was expecting that I wasn't necessarily expecting the. That exact nature of the twist, but I was expecting that there would be some kind of grand reveal that would show how this had all come together. But yeah, I was not expecting that the end result would be, you're all just gonna go free.

Lilly:

Well, and that's another kind of reversal that she does with this story, right? It's not find the bad guy, it's finding the murderer. Reveals that the murdery was the bad guy and has therefore already been taken care of. Which I thought was yeah, just fun, like keeps you on your toes, right.

Sara:

Mm-hmm.

Lilly:

I liked it. It did make me wanna go back into Agatha Christie and read some more, especially'cause it's so moody, like the weather's been so moody.

Sara:

it's good weather for. Detective novels, I feel it did make me wanna read more Poro, and it also made me wanna watch more Death in Paradise, which I really enjoy.

Lilly:

I love murder mysteries, honestly. It's just a, a genre that really appeals to me, and I really like the ones like this where it does set up clues so you can try to figure it out as you're going. there are some mysteries where the twist is a piece of information that the audience doesn't get to find out until the end, and that's how the answer is put together. And that feels kind of cheap to me.

Sara:

Yeah,

Lilly:

feel like Sherlock Holmes tends to do that, or at least the adaptations do.

Sara:

it is been long enough since I have. Read any Sherlock calms or watched any of the adaptations? Actually, I'm not sure if I've seen any of the adaptations except for one of the Robert Downey Jr movies and the first like two seasons of Sherlock. And there are a lot more adaptations than that out there.

Lilly:

Yes.

Sara:

But this is the kind of, I'm gonna call it lighthearted, it's not really lighthearted, but, almost cozy detective novel that I like, or detective story that I like because you can feel good at the end.

Lilly:

Yeah. Okay. I think here's the difference with Poirot. He's walking, well, his fellow. Investigators, but also us, the audience. He's walking us through the information he's gathered and put together. He doesn't share the assumptions he's drawn or the conclusions he's drawn, but. does lay out like the facts as he has figured them out so that we actually can follow along with him. Whereas with Sherlock Holmes, you know, it's from Watson's perspective and all of the, great detective work goes on in Sherlock Holmes' head and it's entirely opaque to us. And you can still kind of get clues, but it's not as much of a like, come along with me on this adventure.

Sara:

Yeah, you're not following along quite as much.

Lilly:

Mm-hmm. And I prefer this way,

Sara:

Yeah, that makes sense.

Lilly:

Just a solid mystery. There's a, yeah. Christie, she knew what she was doing.

Sara:

Yeah. I mean this was fun. It was, it was a nice change of pace too.

Lilly:

It was, but it still felt, I mean, obviously it wasn't fantasy. It took place on earth, but it was so over the top.

Sara:

I mean, it's fantasy in the way they all get off scot free at the

Lilly:

It is so removed from reality in that way. Yeah. Just like the, the whole concept of like, yeah, these 12 or 13 people all gang up together to enact justice, that is 100% justified. Like there is no gray area feeling bad about it.

Sara:

And they actually have a really well thought out plot that only gets kind of foiled because of a snowstorm. Like you would expect that there to be a lot more. Just interpersonal issues. A lot more arguing over how they're going to do it and who's gonna do it and what's gonna happen and like you would expect it to fail that way. And that's not how it fails. I,

Lilly:

Poirot's just too good. And even then it doesn't really fail because he's like, nah, you're fine.

Sara:

yeah, it doesn't fail. I mean, they, still have a very successful uh, murder.

Lilly:

They get the guy and they only kind of get caught

Sara:

They, and they only get caught because Poro is such an excellent

Lilly:

and he doesn't turn them in. So do they even really get caught?

Sara:

Not really.

Lilly:

unmitigated. Good ending, happy ending,

Sara:

Yes.

Lilly:

and that is the best fantasy of all.

Sara:

Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Fiction Fans.

Lilly:

Come disagree with us. We're on Blue Sky and Instagram at Fiction Fans Pod. You can also email us at Fiction fans pod@gmail.com or leave a comment on YouTube.

Sara:

If you enjoyed the episode, please rate and review on Spotify and Apple Podcasts and follow us wherever your podcasts live.

Lilly:

We also have a Patreon where you can support us and find exclusive episodes and a lot of other nonsense.

Sara:

And sometimes you can vote on the book that we're going to read for the podcast.

Lilly:

like today.

Sara:

Thanks again for listening, and may your villains always be defeated.

Lilly:

Bye.