A Reader's Guide to Agatha Christie

Where to start for the beginner, and where to go if you're a seasoned reader

Feb 18, 2025

I have always loved reading mysteries — my love for this genre probably started with Nancy Drew and Harry Potter, but I really hit my stride when I discovered Agatha Christie and Arthur Conan Doyle.

I’ve read dozens of Christie’s mysteries. They are the perfect dose of comfort and intrigue on a cold winder night (particularly for those who, like me, are somewhat averse to books that are traditionally labelled as ‘cozy’ or ‘feel-good.’)

In this newsletter I’d like to share with you all a comprehensive guide to her works, including: a bit about the author, how her works are organized, where to start, and where to go next (plus, resources for the overachieving readers who have already read all her books).

*A note: this newsletter is long and doesn’t necessarily need to be read and internalized all at once. My hope is that you will bookmark this as a resource and return to it whenever you need it!
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On The Novel Tea Podcast

Last week on the podcast, we discussed The Fall of the House of Usher by Edgar Allen Poe, along with a horror novella retelling of the story, What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher. We got into all kinds of fun theories and context — you can listen to that episode here:

It was partly this foray into Poe (who wrote the first modern detective story) that inspired today’s guide.

The Author

Agatha Mary Clarissa Christie (née Miller) was born in 1890 in Devon, England. As a child she enjoyed creating characters for herself and fantasy play, and was encouraged to write by her mother.

After some early disappointments and rejections, she published her first novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, in 1920. The book featured her famous Belgian detective, Hercule Poirot, who was partly inspired by the Belgian Soldiers she helped to treat as a volunteer nurse in World War I.

The Disappearance of Agatha Christie

In 1926, Christie became mired in a scandal that may well have spouted from the pages of one of her own novels: after a quarrel with her husband (who had fallen in love with another woman), Christie disappeared from her home. The next morning, her car was discovered parked outside a chalk quarry with clothes inside.

The disappearance was quickly publicized. More than a thousand police officers and tens of thousands of volunteers searched the area. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle gave one of Christie’s gloves to a spirit medium in order to help find her.

Ten days later, she was found in a hotel 184 miles from her home, registered as a “Mrs. Tressa Neele” from Capetown South Africa. The details surrounding the disappearance are still shrouded in mystery.1

Agatha Christie’s Legacy

Christie ultimately wrote nearly 70 detective novels as well as several short story collections. She also wrote romance novels like Unfinished Portrait (1934) and A Daughter’s a Daughter (1952) under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott.

She remains one of the most translated authors in the world, and today still holds the crown as the Queen of Mystery.

The Detectives

Christie’s books feature several different detectives, whom I’ll briefly introduce here:

Hercule Poirot

Hercule Poirot is perhaps Christie’s most famous character, the exacting Belgian detective with a stiff mustache. Poirot is a big believer in psychology; in order to solve his mysteries, he must understand the emotions and thoughts of all the characters involved. Once he has reviewed all the facts, he meditates with the use of his “little grey cells” until he has arrived at an answer.

He is occasionally seen along with his friend and confidante, Arthur Hastings (the Watson to Poirot’s Holmes), though he is often on his own. Poirot appears in 33 of Christie’s novels.

I was sad to learn that over the years, Christie grew tired of Poirot (much as Doyle grew tired of Holmes), writing in her diary that she found him “insufferable.”

Miss Marple

Miss Jane Marple was first introduced in a series of short stories published in 1927 that were later grouped into the collection The Thirteen Problems. Miss Marple is an elderly spinster who solves crimes in quiet English villages.

Miss Marple appears in 12 of Christie’s novels and 20 short stories.

*Disclaimer: I should mention here that I much prefer Poirot. I find Miss Marple a bit tedious as a character — you’ll see this bias reflected in the list below, though I tried to stay impartial.

Tommy and Tuppence

Thomas “Tommy” Beresford and his wife Prudence “Tuppence” Cowley, first introduced in The Secret Adversary, appear in four novels and one collection of short stories. These stories are a bit lighter than her other mysteries, and feature more intrigue than tension.

Other Detectives

There are several other detectives who make appearances here and there, including: Harley Quin, Parker Pyne, Superintendent Battle, and Colonel Race.

The Books

And now, the moment you’ve all been waiting for! Read on to figure out which books you should read, based on your familiarity with Christie (and mystery novels in general) and reading taste.

The books are organized so that you might “work your way up” from her more traditional stories, to her best works, to the more eclectic and unique ones.

Where to Start

In truth, you can start anywhere — there is no prescribed order. But sometimes it can be daunting to know where to begin. Here are my suggestions:

The Mysterious Affair at Styles (Poirot #1)

The Premise: Hercule Poirot has retired near Styles Court, the estate of the elderly Emily Inglethorp. When Emily is poisoned, Poirot steps in to investigate the many suspects: the victim’s young husband, her resentful stepsons, a hired companion, and a nurse.

Notes: this book is a great introduction to Christie’s style, and figures a traditional ‘locked room’ mystery. If you, however, feel that you’d rather read her best work first, this may not be for you.

Read this first if: you are type A, you like to start at the beginning, and you like the idea of being an author completionist.

Death on the Nile (Poirot #18)

The Premise: Linnet Ridgeway was looking forward to a tranquil cruise along the Nile — but late one night, she is murdered in her cruise cabin. This book has a large cast of characters, some rich and famous, and each with a motive for murder.

Read this first if: you like foreign settings and wealthy characters, and you want to get a good sense of Christie’s signature style.

The Body in the Library (Marple #2)

The Premise: It is 7am. The Bantrys wake up to find the body of a young woman in their library. Who is she, and how did she get there?

Read this first if: you find talkative spinsters charming, you enjoy fictional libraries, and you want a bit of soap opera-esque drama.

Where to Next?

Now that you’ve gotten a sense of Christie’s style, here are some that you might love, either because they subvert expectations, or because they’re building on (or creating) tropes that mystery readers might be familiar with:

The Clocks (Poirot #39)

The Premise: Sheila Webb comes to a seaside job to accept a new job as a typist. When she arrives, she finds a well-dressed corpse surrounded by six clocks. What’s more, the owner of the house, Mrs. Pebmarsh, denies ever hiring a typist — and neither of them know the victim.

Notes: this book is notable for the fact that Poirot never visits the crime scenes, nor does he speak to the witnesses or suspects (which also means that he isn’t as present in this book as he is in his others). He is challenged to solve the crime based on his intellect alone.

Five Little Pigs (Poirot #25)

The Premise: sixteen years ago, Caroline Crale was convicted for poisoning her husband, and sentenced to life in prison. Now, her grown daughter comes to Poirot with a posthumous letter from her mother claiming that she was innocent. Crale’s daughter asks Poirot to reopen the case, and his investigation brings him to five other people who were with the Crales on the fatal day.

The Mirror Crack’d from Side to Side (Marple #8)

The Premise: one minute, Heather is chattering to her favorite movie star, and the next she has suffered a massive seizure and is found dead. It turns out to be a result of a deadly poison. Miss Marple must investigate — not clues, but human nature.

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The Crème de la Crème

The titles below are some of Christie’s best, and in my opinion, they should be read only after one has already read several of her other works for maximum enjoyment.

I highly recommend avoiding looking up or reading anything about these books online until you’ve finished. As these are some of her most famous books, they are talked about constantly, and it’s terrible to have the ending of a book spoiled before you’ve finished it!

Murder on the Orient Express (Poirot #10)

The Premise: the famous Orient Express stops in its tracks just after midnight in the middle of the Balkan mountains. By morning, one of its passengers is dead: an American tycoon is found dead in his compartment, with the door locked from the inside. Poirot must identify the murder… before they decide to strike again.

Notes: this book was recently made famous by the Kenneth Branagh adaptation, but I promise the book is so much better.2

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (Poirot #4)

The Premise: the widow Ferrars has died from an overdose of Veronal in the peaceful English village of King’s Abbot. Less than a day later, the man she had planned to marry, Roger Ackroyd, is murdered. To solve the case, Poirot’s “little grey cells” are put to the test.

And Then There Were None

The Premise: ten strangers are summoned as weekend guests to a private island off the coast of Devon, only to find that their host, an eccentric millionaire, is nowhere to be found. One by one, the guests begin to die… who is behind this horrible scheme?

Notes: even casual readers will recognize how this book has inspired tons of spin-offs, retellings, and adaptations. Even if you don’t love this book, reading it can help add to our understanding of what has become such a popular trope in the mystery/crime genre.

Another Note: the first edition of this book was published with an incredibly racist title, and even beyond this book, Christie was not perfect. There have been many reports of her racist and anti-semitic views, many of which have worked their way into her works — I do not condone any of this. But I also don’t believe in cancel culture, just as I do not believe in thoughtless consumption of media — I encourage you to read every book carefully and with a critical eye.

Something Different

These books are a bit different from her other novels, and if you’d like to branch out with style and genre, these are for you.

Towards Zero (Superintendent Battle #5)

The Premise: an elderly widow is murdered at a clifftop house on the seaside. When a house party gathers, the events of the previous months come to a dramatic head.

Why it’s different: this book starts, not with the murder, but much before, going into the lives of the various players in this story. To understand what happens, the story claims, we must first understand the people, their relationships, their emotions, and desires. This book is much more interested in the inner lives of its characters than other Christie’s books, and I found that fascinating.

The Big Four (Poirot #5)

The Premise: Poirot arrives home to find a stranger standing in the doorway of his bedroom, coated in dust. He sways, and then falls. Who is this man, and what happened to him? Poirot is pulled with this mystery into a world of international intrigue, in order to discover the truth about the ‘Big Four.’

Why it’s different: this book is much less a cozy locked-room murder mystery than her other books; instead, it more closely resembles spy novels, following in the tradition of crime & espionage stories.

The Mousetrap

The Premise: a group of people gathered in a country house are snowed in when they realize there is a murderer in their midst. Slowly, the characters reveal their pasts until the murderer is discovered.

Why it’s different: this is one of the few plays that Christie wrote, and as such, I don’t know if I would actually recommend reading it. The play is one of the longest running productions and has been performed in the West End of London since 1952.

Notes: if you’re curious, the movie See How They Run is part-parody, part-homage to this play, and it was lots of fun!

To Finish:

Curtain (Poirot #44)

The Premise: arthritic and immobilized, Poirot calls his old friend Hastings to be his eyes and ears to help with a murder investigation. The murderer, ‘X’ has already killed several victims, and they must work quickly in order to prevent another murder.

Notes: Curtain is the final Poirot story Christie wrote; she locked it away in a cupboard, and it was only published after her death in 1975.

Sleeping Murder (Marple #12)

The Premise: soon after Gwenda moves into her new home, odd things start to happen. She begins to feel an irrational sense of terror each time she climbs the stairs. Gwenda turns to Miss Marple to help exorcise her ghosts.

Notes: like above, this was the last Miss Marple mystery that Christie wrote, and it was published after her death.

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Where to Go Once You’ve Read Them All:

There are many, many more Christie novels than I have space to discuss here — and I hope, now that you are familiar with her work, you feel empowered to go on and discover all her other books.

And if you can’t get enough of Christie, here are some fun links and resources to keep you occupied:

All About Agatha: a podcast dedicated to Agatha Christie, her life, and her writings.

Queen of Crime: How Agatha Christie created the modern murder mystery [The New Yorker]

The Essential Agatha Christie: Whether you want to be scared, shocked or stumped, we will help you pick your poison [NYT, gift link]

This great collection helps you pick your next read based on themes and moods, such as “Take me to a remote inn” and “Scare me”

16 Modern Mysteries for Fans of Golden Age Detective Novels [Bookbub]

I enjoyed some of these, and found the others to be just okay. I don’t know if they all necessarily fit the style of Christie, but who knows, you might find your next favorite mystery from this list!

— Shruti

This was the first reading guide we’ve released — what did you think? Would you like to see more? What authors or themes would you like to see more of? Let us know in the comments or by replying directly to this email!