Hickory Dickory Dock

Very muddling and confusing especially how the detective, Poirot does come about his findings. ( )

Não lido.

In which a rash of petty thefts at a student hostel mask greater crimes…

"Hickory Dickory Dock" is by no means a masterpiece, falling squarely into that camp of run-of-the mill Christie stories that she churned out during the middle of her career. The good: a thorough characterisation of Poirot himself (one of only a few novels in which Miss Lemon actually appears; she’s primarily confined to the short stories); an overly healthy dose of misdirection; and, most importantly, a cast of characters in which all of them seem like viable suspects.

The negatives: it’s one of those forcibly contrived novels in which a variety of criminals and people in disguise inhabit the same space; the eponymous nursery rhyme bears even less sense than usual (a painful element taken to extremes in the Suchet adaptation); and things feel far more routine than usual. The Suchet adaptation, similarly, plays well enough and holds the interest, but can’t help but feel like a by-the-numbers ‘murder mystery’, not aided by one of those “twenty years ago” opening scenes that lead the mind – consciously or otherwise – toward the denouement before it should arrive there.

Suitable for Christie fans, but probably not an eye-catcher for novices. The U.S. title became "Hickory Dickory Death", furthering my theory that the publishers just wanted a pulpy title for every release. The Italian title, moreover, was "Poirot si annoia", or "Poirot is Bored". I’m not surprised.

Poirot ranking: 28th out of 38 ( )

This story finds Hercule Pairot helping out the sister of his receptionist, mostly so the woman will stop worring and concerate on her work. The setting, a boarding house full of college kids that the sister oversees, is one both a cleaver sort of hot house and, to her credit, has an international cast of students and at least touches on the political concerns of the time. The ending, though, seems to come on a bit quickly and there is no great scene of them confronting the murderer. Still, an interesting effort ( )

I have had that rhyme in my head since last night. I want to smother myself to just make it stop at this point.

I also somehow saw the television adaption of this story a few months ago, I now remember why I turned it off. They kept playing a slow sung ballad to the nursery rhyme throughout the entire show.

So we have Poirot firmly in the 1950s in England. This is a post WWII England and now the books feel different in a way that they have not in the earlier ones. There is no more separation between the upper and lower classes like there were in the earlier books. I am thinking at this point Poirot has to be well into his 60s or 70s. In the earlier books he was supposed to be retired and I think was around his late 40s so it has been about 20 years since most of his earlier cases.

In this new England we now have "blacks" in England and co-ed housing. We don't have characters saying monstrous things about people from other races. Although we do get a bit of them patting those of other races on the heads a bit and calling them pets or perfectly lovely.

We also get more women being independent and not running off to be married. In past stories Agatha Christie seemed to be down on women after WWII who tried to shrug off typical gender roles (see Taken at the Flood and After the Funeral) and now she seems to be okay with it in this book.

In this story alone we deal with several young single women and even Ms. Lemon's widowed sister who though she doesn't need the income, likes to work in order to still feel useful. There seems to be a plethora of working women or women attempting to obtain degrees. There was a little romance included in this book and I did like the handling of it, FYI the woman was take charge and even asked someone to be her soon to be husband's best man.

What I would consider the main characters are of course Hercule Poirot, Miss Lemon, and Miss Lemon's sister Mrs. Hubbard.

The secondary characters are the young men and women who live at the hostel. I can say that I was astounded by the number of characters from different backgrounds that Ms. Christie included in this book.

We have Ahmed Ali (an Egyptian student), Akibombo (West African student), Celia Austin (chemist that works in a hospital), Len Bateson (studying medicine and surgery), Nigel Chapman (student), Sally Finch (an American who is in England studying), Rene Helle (French student, Valerie Hobhouse (co-owner of a beauty parlor), Elizabeth Johnston (Jamaican student), Chandra Lal (Indian student) Patricia Lane (student), Genevieve Maricaud (French student), Colin McNabb (student), Gopal Ram (Indian student), and Jean Tomlinson (does physical therapy at the local hospital).

Another character that is included is the owner of the hostel, Mrs. Mrs Christina Nicoletis who I swear come straight out of central casting with some of the students above with how they are portrayed in this book.

I was surprised by how funny this book was in parts. I mean you don't think that someone stealing things would be a hoot, but I think reading about Poirot's reactions to Miss Lemon making mistakes, the way Miss Lemon's brain works, and the students not disgust, but general oh here is a weird old man manner towards Poirot was funny.

I did find that the whole why behind the murders in this book seemed a bit too far fetched. Though I did like the initial parts of the book with Poirot being flabbergasted that Miss Lemon has made mistakes in his letters. This and his own boredom is why he gets involved with the goings on at the hostel.

I can say that I did find Poirot a little smarter in this one. I am still floored by how dumb the ending was and the reason why he figured out who dun it in After the Funeral. However, after that ending I realize that any book would be a marked improvement.

And of course I am going to say that Ms. Christie used just enough of Poirot in this one to make the book good. I don't really care for the books when he comes in at the halfway point, or when we stay with another character the whole way through with their musings about Poirot and the case. After a while it just felt like lazy storytelling.

In the end the resolution to the case was not a simple explanation and I was totally off base. Though I do agree with what one person said about how the the murders may have been prevented if something had been done regarding the murderer earlier on.

I am now curious how the series ends since it seems that the last couple of books have barely been interesting. I have six more Poirot books to go! ( )