READING THE CUCKOO'S CALLING

 J.K. Rowling discusses 'Strike - The Cuckoo's Calling'

Death at the Opera by GLADYS MITCHELL

Book: Death at the Opera
Author: Gladys Mitchell
Publication year: 1934

It was the realisation on the importance of reading golden age crime fiction which led me to various renowned authors such as Daphne Maurier, Dorothy L Sayers, G K Chesterton, Gladys Mitchell etc. And it was 'Death at the Opera' by Mitchell, I chose to read first.

Since I was accustomed to the writings of certain authors whom I read incessantly, I always found it a bit difficult to adjust to the style of new authors at least for a couple of pages. To my surprise, Mitchell's writing did not pose any such hurdles before me. I was totally engrossed in the book right from the first page.

Miss Calma Ferris was dead. She chose to commit suicide on the night of opera in the Hillmaston school where she taught. She was found sitting in a chair with her head drowned in a wash basin full of water. Miss Ferris was supposed to play the potent role of ' Katisha' in the opera called ' The Mikado'. Since she was found missing on that night, her part was enacted by another staff, Mrs Boyle.

The coroner's verdict said it's suicide.  But Mr Cliffordson, Headmaster of the school had his doubts as he found the pipe of wash basin was tampered with. It was blocked with clay.

Without wasting much time he sought the help of an elderly and sly psychoanalyst Mrs Bradley to investigate the case. The first few chapters were devoted to showing the kind of person Miss Ferris was. She had none except an aunt who was running a lodge. Though kind on her face, the aunt never had a sincere liking for Ferris.

 Her life was colourless and moral values very high. But she was a sort of person who could be happy with all the goodness happening to others. Her life was sans expectations with little time for rantings and ravings.

It's rather surprising to know that an inoffensive woman like Ferris could get murdered.

Through her analysis, Mrs Bradley came across people who had the opportunity and motives to kill Calma Ferris. But she was caught on the horns of a dilemma for the people who had the motives to kill never had the opportunity and those with opportunity did not have the motives.

 Even the motives did not seem like substantial ones that could make a person take somebody else's life. For instance,
 1) Ferris had destroyed a clay statuette, Mr Smith, the art teacher was making, not deliberate of course. He was given compensation by Mrs Boyle, later.

 2) She had witnessed Miss Cliffordson, another staff and Hurstwood, a student kissing. When the student was head over heels in love with Miss Cliffordson, she never forbade him from seeking any intimacy with her. She never loved him, though.

3) She had discovered the clandestine relationship between two senior staff Mr Hampstead and Mrs Boyle. The former's wife was an alcoholic and was admitted to an asylum and the latter was a widow. They were in a relationship for the past 11 years.

Just a few days before the opera, Ferris' aunt had sent a telegram warning him of a person called Helm whom she had met while staying in the lodge run by her aunt. That was the only clue which could make the reader think there was more to the plot. This took Bradley to Bognor and there comes the twist in the tale - Two more murders by drowning. ' An epidemic of drowning' as she would like to call them.

I cannot talk about my dislikes for the book I am reading her for the first time. Mrs Bradley is new to me and I am sure I will get to know the kind of person she is through her other stories. I like the method  Mrs Bradley employs to deduce who's the culprit. It's helpful for a reader who wants to be a writer.
Even though Mrs Bradley was noting down the causes that could make someone a potential murderer, which also gave the reader a feeling that she/he was moving along with her in finding out the culprit, I failed to pinpoint the real murderer.

 I was clueless who the murderer was until the end. But what I could not come to terms with was the motive that made the culprit commit the murder. It sounded flimsy. But I would like to think that a human being cannot be expected to behave in a certain way. Sometimes feelings and emotions can be betraying.

by Shalet Jimmy

The Second Time Around - Mary Higgins Clark ( 2003)

I am a die- hard fan of Mary Higgins Clark. What I like about her is the gentle way of narrating a story. I think she is a writer who does not believe in gory descriptions to make her stories more thrilling. Still, there's mystery and suspense that can put you on tenterhooks right from the first page.

Her narrations lack artificiality. Perhaps, it might be because she finds clues for her story from the newspapers - in other words, incidents that happen in the normal lives of people and the reader can relate to the story, easily.

Nicholas Spencer, the head of Gen - Stone, a company which is developing medicine against cancer disappears without a trace. The wreckage of his plane is found but not his body, raising many eyebrows. What if he has staged this accident? Maybe because he was aware that the vaccine is not going to work.  Lots of people whose dear ones are being victims of the deadliest disease have invested their whole money in the Gen- Stone stocks - Ned and Marty being two among them. After the news of his death starts doing rounds, Nick's bungalow has been set ablaze by someone. Lynn, Nick's wife had a close shave.

Carly Decarlo who writes financial advice columns is now a journalist in the Wall Street Weekly and her first assignment is to do a cover story on Nick. Carley has met Nick personally and for her, he has come across as a genuine person. She too invested her money in his company. Apart from it, Lynn
  is Carley's stepsister. After her father's death, Carley's mother got married to Lynn's father. As the story progresses, Carley feels that Nick is murdered. Her doubt is intensified when Dr Boedrick who bought Nick's house where his father used to do experiments meets with an accident just after he passes on to her the information that he has handed over the record of experiments to a red - headed guy.

I have read many thrillers. But I could not figure out who was behind the murder though there were many explicit clues. That's the beauty of her craft and maybe because of this I might have immersed myself in the story rather than interrupting my reading thinking who is the culprit. This book might not be her best but it's worth reading.

- by Shalet Jimmy

'Murder On The Orient Express' Official Trailer (2017) - Johnny Depp, Jo...

MY NAME IS HERCULE POIROT. AND I AM PROBABLY THE GREATEST DETECTIVE IN THE WORLD
The die-hard fans of Agatha Christie fans will have to try hard to forget the David Suchet's Poirot and accept Kenneth Branag's 'Hercule Poirot'. Loved the background score..

' Murder on the Orient Express 2017 version trailer is out for Agatha Christie fans out there....

also starring Johnny Depp, Judi Dench, Daisy Ridley, Michelle Pfeiffer

The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie

Years ago, an English spinster was found murdered in a hotel called Savoy in Mussoorie, India. The British were ruling the country then. There was little information on whether the murder case was solved. But what was known that this case later provided a backdrop for a writer in Britain to base her first crime novel upon.

The book was rejected six times. But when it eventually saw the light of the day, it made the author an undisputed name in the genre of crime writing and enabled her to produce several other such works which were outsold only by the Bible and Shakespeare.

 The author was none other than Agatha Christie and the book was “ The Mysterious affair at Styles.”
If Madge, Agatha Christie’s elder sister had not challenged her to write a detective fiction, probably, her debut novel “The Mysterious Affair at Styles” would not have happened.
This book introduced the world-famous Belgian detective Hercule Poirot, who had absolute faith in his “ his little grey cells” to millions of her fans across the globe.

Hercule Poirot had just retired from the Belgian Police and was settling down at Styles St Mary. It was Emily Cavendish, the mistress of Style court that lay a mile the other side of Styles, who had helped him to start his life afresh. But to his utter dismay,  Cavendish, who had recently become Emily Inglethorp as she had married Alfred Inglethorp lost her life in her boudoir.

Captain Arthur Hastings, who was later to become the companion of Poirot had been there in Styles as he was invited by his friend John Cavendish, one of the stepsons of Emily Inglethorp. Hastings had appeared in eight other Poirot novels. Being injured at the war front, he was recuperating at Styles and was the narrator of the story.
Though, autocratic in nature Inglethorp had taken care of her stepsons’ - John and Lawrence need and treated them as her own sons. But things started going awry when she married Alfred Inglethorp who was much younger to her. And one fine morning, Emily Cavendish dies miserably in front of her sons, daughter in law Mary Cavendish and Hastings and also Dr. Bauerstein.

If you ask me who is the real villain of the story, I would say Strychnine - a highly toxic, colourless pesticide. Emily Cavendish was poisoned with strychnine. As Poirot had found a partly burnt paper from her boudoir, it became obvious to him that she had written a will and somebody had tried to burn it.

Was she poisoned because of that will?

It’s an indisputable fact that her experience in a hospital dispensary during first world war had helped her to gain immense knowledge of poisons. And she had skillfully used her knowledge in many of her books, especially, in “ The Mysterious Affairs at Styles”

Kathryn Harkup, a British chemist, and author who was in India in 2015 to participate in a crime writer's festival said " Many of Agatha Christie's fans know how she deftly used her knowledge of poison in her works. But what is less known is that her toxic arsenal – comprising over 30 compounds – included many Indian plants."

Christie is well known for her ‘ famous twists’ in the plots. When the reader feels that she/he is almost near the culprit, she twists the entire plot. Remember her famous twist in “ The Murder on the Orient Express’. You can see the streak of that twist in her first book also.
As he says in this book “ I find there’s a method in his madness” after Styles story, I feel that I should also alter my method of reading Christie. I mean I should delve more deeply into her plots and characters.

- Shalet Jimmy