Book Review: The Murder at the Vicarage by Agatha Christie

The Murder at the Vicarage by Agatha Christie
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I first discovered Agatha Christie in high school and read right through all of them. Lately, I’ve been watching various adaptations of the Mrs. Marple mysteries from PBS Mystery! and decided I wanted to see how they compared to the books. I started with the first Mrs. Marple. An enjoyable read. Not anything that left me sitting on the edge of my seat, but a good mystery. It, however, did not focus on Mrs. Marple, she was almost secondary. The mystery is narrated by the vicar, whose home (the vicarage) is where the murdered occurred. I did have a gap in reading this and was able to pick up where I left off, however, there are a lot of characters and sometimes I had to think about who was who (but, this could be due to the gap in reading).

Overall, it’s a good mystery with an unanticipated ending and Mrs. Marple did do the big reveal. And, yes, the PBS Mystery! did stay true to the novel -- at least the movie with Joan Hickson as Mrs. Marple (who, in my opinion, is by far the best Mrs. Marple).

I will be adding another Mrs. Marple to my to-read list just to see if the narration continues to be done by someone other than Mrs. Marple. Really, though, in the end, you can’t go wrong with Agatha Christie.

View all my reviews