The ABC Murders

Written by Agatha Christie

Narrated by Hugh Fraser

There’s a serial killer on the loose, bent on working his way through the alphabet. And as a macabre calling card he leaves beside each victim’s corpe the ABC Railway Guide open at the name of the town where the murder has taken place.

Having begun with Andover, Bexhill and then Churston, there seems little chance of the murderer being caught – until he makes the crucial and vain mistake of challenging Hercule Poirot to frustrate his plans…

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Release date: Sep 12, 2006
• ISBN: 9780007248735

Agatha Christie

Agatha Christie is the most widely published author of all time, outsold only by the Bible and Shakespeare. Her books have sold more than a billion copies in English and another billion in a hundred foreign languages. She died in 1976, after a prolific career spanning six decades.

Reviews for The ABC Murders

[riverwillow · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I love this book, it's a classic Christie story. A superb mystery , full of misdirection and with a twist in the tale. Oh yes and Hastings is back, I am very fond of Hastings.

[deltaqueen50 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The A.B.C. Murders is a cleverly plotted story about a serious of random murders. The victims are from different places, are of different sexes and ages. The only sure thing is that that killer started with the initial A and is working his way through the alphabet. Hercule Poirot comes into the hunt due to the letters he receives from the killer taunting him and giving him slight advance notice of the location of the next murder. A slightly different plotline from her usual Hercule Poirot stories, but it did include the familiar ending where Poirot gathers all involved for the big reveal. A well-crafted, interesting mystery with enough twists to keep the reader on their toes. The A.B.C. Murders is one of my favorite Agatha Christie mysteries and I thoroughly enjoyed this visit with the quirky detective.

[figgles_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Hercule Poirot and Hastings are in pursuit of a killer who kills by the book, an ABC railway guide... but is everything what it seems? Vintage Poirot.

[smiler69 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A serial killer sends Hercule Poirot a letter telling him about the murder he plans to commit in Andover. The victim turns out to be an old woman by the name of Alice Ascher, and an ABC train guide is found near her body. The next letter tells Poirot the murder will take place in Bexhill-on-Sea, where the young Betty Barnard is found strangled, and again the ABC guide is found near her person. While the police force and Poirot are scrambling to find the identity of the madman before he gets through the entire alphabet, two more people are killed, and while the case is complicated enough, things are not at all what they seem. This was a good, solid Poirot mystery, but I can't say I was enthralled. Is it because I was passionate about Agatha Christie novels as a teenager and devoured them like so many chocolate bonbons that the second time around doesn't seem quite as sweet? Might I have sated my hunger then? or have my memories of those first discoveries failed to evolve along with me over the years? Have I become too jaded? I don't know, maybe all of the above. There's no denying that the dame knew how to write a great crime novel, but she's influenced so many generations of writers since that it's hard for me to appreciate the originality of her work anymore without feeling like the whole deal has grown a bit stale with age. An image of precious antique lace doilies and trinkets covered with a fine coating of dust comes to mind. Apologies to Christie's unerring fans. Perhaps I might grow to appreciate her fully again in another quarter century or so.

[smik_3 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A foreword to this story by Captain Arthur Hastings saysIn this narrative of mine I have departed from my usual practice of relating only those incidents and scenes at which I myself was present. Certain chapters, therefore, are written in the third person.Hastings returns to England from South America in June 1935 to put his finances in order. Mrs Hasting stays home to look after the ranch. He finds Hercule Poirot installed in a new service flat in London - a sign of the times. Poirot looks remarkably well, his hair is blacker than Hastings expects (per favour of a bottle).Poirot has tried to retire several times already but is fearful that his "little grey cells.. [will].. grow the rust". So now he only takes cases that are the "cream of crime". In his most recent case he says he had a narrow escape, he was nearly exterminated. He is however looking forward to teaming up again with Hastings.I believe in luck - in destiny, if you will. It is your destiny to stand beside me and prevent me from committing the unforgiveable error.With that he plucks from his papers a note he recently received signed A B C that challenges him, in quite unpleasant terms, to solving a mystery that will take place at Andover on the 21st of the month. Poirot fears the note may be referring to a murder.Poirot consults his old friend Inspector Japp from Scotland Yard and so the police are alerted to look out for a murder in Andover on the 21st. This duly occurs. And elderly woman, a shop keeper is struck down in her shop, and the prime suspect, but for the letter to Poirot, would have been her estranged drunken sot of a husband.This begins what appears to be a spree of killings, each with an alphabetical clue. In each case a copy of the ABC Railway Guide is left with the body. Poirot recognises this is different to the intime sort of crime he is usually called on to investigate - crimes committed by one member of a family against another. This killer appears to be psychotic and he is playing with Poirot's mind.To help him solve the crime, or perhaps to keep an eye on them, Poirot calls together all the immediate family victims of the crimes, and turns them into a sort of vigilante band. This is an unusual step but quite in line with his usual strategies, where he will make at least one of the characters a confidante.I could tell you much more, but you need to read it for yourself. As you can probably tell from the tone of what I've written above, I really enjoyed THE ABC MURDERS. There's an occasional sprinkling of humour - looking for the one about Hasting's "comb-over" - and there is tension built by Poirot's likening of the acts of a serial murderer to the roll of the dice on the roulette wheel. He says that eventually the murderer will make a mistake. We also have a red herring to contend with from almost the beginning of the story.

[luv2danse9 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A mysterious "homicidal maniac" by the name of A.B.C. begins knocking people off based on an alphabetical scheme -- beginning with A. Ascher in Andover. It's up to private investigator Hercule Poirot and his friend Captain... er... Hastings to catch this crook before he can get from A to Z. This book chronicles the events of the murders and chase of the killer, with a nice little twist at the end which readers know must be coming but cannot quite figure out. The question Poirot asks himself through the whole case is not "who?" but "why?" which helps him catch the killer in the end. The twist at the end itself was clever and surprising, but I found myself waiting impatiently for it. While the rest of the book held my attention, I found it a little dull at times. The characters for the most part did not enthrall me, and the methodical investigation of the murders was a little redundant. However, after I finished the book, the turn of events kept me thinking for a while. I'd recommend it, but it definitely is not a "must read."

[missboyer3 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

There's a serial killer on the loose, bent on working his way though the alphabet. There seems little chance of the murderer being caught -- until her makes the crucial and vain mistake of challenging Hercule Poirot to frustrate his plans ...

[archangel582 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Definitely one of the better Poirots. Unusually for Agatha Christie, a psychopathic serial killer is murdering people completely unknown to him, based only on the alphabet and an ABC railway guide. Could be seen as more modern than some of her other books. I'm not sure why I think that but the thought struck me very early on and didn't go away. There was more tension built up by the end than in some others because everyone can tell what will happen unless Poirot works out who did it, in a seemingly unsolvable mystery. Ending was both believable and completely surprising. I certainly didn't guess it, and I have a fairly good track record.

[readafew · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The ABC Murders, Poirot is taunted by a serial murderer in personal notes sent to him. He has a hard time discovering the culprit until after all the crimes have been committed. This one has some interesting twists. This is a great fun read and an excellent Agatha Christie mystery.

[felicitywindmill · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Fabulous misdirection and great charcters. Told from the perspective of the loveable Captain Hastings this is an engaging crime story. I was able to guess at the twist but the way the story was told did not allow me to focus my mind on it and work out who the murderer was. One of her best I think.

[love_musik_2 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

One of the first ones I read. Loved it! it was so creative and brilliant, good twists.

[asphalt_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Very interesting, and although Agatha always keeps you in the dark as to A.B.C.'s true identity, it's still quite a fun book. I do dislike the few french words squeezed into the text however, mostly due to the fact that I don't speak French. Outside that however, I would reccomend this book to any mystery fan. Somebody who dislikes mysteries however, will of course find this book quite lacking.

[amphipodgirl · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

I found this fairly disappointing. Christie is less fun when she's trying to be creepy.

[cerian_2 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Fun quick read. My first Agatha Christie; I will definitely read more of her novels.

[lizzybeans11 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I read this because I was in need of a book to help pass some time one day. At under 200 pages it's nice and quick.I haven't read much of Christie's work and I was worried this was going to be very formulaic. However, I was intrigued by her range of style to keep the reader guessing. Christie also definitely had a sense of humour about writing murder mysteries and that's what keeps her work relevant and readable today.

[alexthehunn · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is a delightful murder mystery featuring Hercule Poirot, this time assisted and narrated by Colonel Hastings, Watson to Poirot's Holmes. There are plenty of twists, red herrings, and misdirection in this tale so stay alert. Christie is like a stage magician in that the whole time you know you're being fooled and yet it almost always works and it's all fun.

[Jill Brooks · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Agatha Christie is always extremely readable and not old fashioned

[stewartry · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

What: paperbackWhat else: First person narrativeWherefore: it was on Mount TBR, and my Kindle was acting up Hastings: "I admit," I said, "that a second murder in a book often cheers things up." Poirot has semi-retired, but has discovered he is no better suited to the state than Holmes is said to have been, and so lets it be known that he is available to take those cases that interest him (again, like Holmes). At the beginning of this tale Hastings has come home to England from his ranch in Argentina, and expresses his hopes that some interesting case might pop up while he's there. And, of course, it does. Though it does not necessarily seem that way at first. Poirot receives an odd letter – printed, in common ink on common paper, and a postmark unremarkable – which proposes a challenge for the great mind. It's cheeky, and mildly insulting to the famous detective, and is signed "A.B.C.", and indicates that something is going to happen on a specific day in a specific town, and let's just see how clever you are! Hastings pooh-poohs the letter as one of those things written by some random crazy person, but Poirot is troubled by it. Something does indeed happen on that day in that town: an elderly woman is found murdered in her tobacco shop. Poirot, uneasy, heads to the crime scene. Hastings makes no bones about how utterly bored he is with the mere "sordid murder of an old woman". It's because the killer seems to be obvious – if Poirot hadn't received the letter there would never have been any question about it. And it's also because the victim is dull. A sordid domestic dispute is the only reason an older woman would be murdered. Bo-ring. This was about when I realized how little I like Hastings. I don't know if Christie was purposely using the smart Holmes-stupid Watson template, but Watson was never this thick, and would have given a damn about the death of an old woman, whether it was a case deserving of a great detective or not. As it turns out, this is deserving: the woman's name, her shop name, and her town all begin with "A". Then another letter comes directing Poirot's attention to a town beginning with "B". Uh oh. And sure enough, the victims begin to pile up, in strict alphabetical order. I've never been a big Poirot fan. I don't know if it's the prissiness or the accent or the little grey cells or the mustache or what, but I'll take Miss Marple any time, scary as she can be. In fact, I pulled this off the shelf because I would have sworn it was a Miss M. Oops. Still, the story was fun – except for one thing, which will be a spoiler I'll mark as such in the last paragraph of this review. It was as though Christie made up her mind to make this a very thorough departure from the usual plot, and had some fun playing with her serial killer. She also had fun with her secondary characters. A few of them – one victim's sister, another's niece, the official investigators – were lovely, with a surprising amount of life for minor characters in a fairly short book. I liked the attitudes taken toward the string of crimes. Poirot is grave; Hastings is confused (no surprise there); Japp and the other professional investigators are grimly determined to stop this string of sequential murders before it gets too far into the alphabet. "I", they figure. Hopefully "H". They're just being realistic, but the apparent callousness of it is breathtaking, like the tv crime shows where the detectives are seen joking over the corpse (*cough*Rizzoli and Isles*cough*). The solution is the part that bothered me – and here comes a big fat spoiler (though it's who the killer is not rather than who it is). The actual identity of the actual murderer was fairly satisfying. It was the fact that the narrative often broke away from Hastings's first-person journal entries to follow an unknown about for a little while in the most incriminating manner – that was what annoyed me. In a way, the poor man was so obviously the murderer that it was obvious he was not the murderer, if you know what I mean; however, it felt like being lied to when it became clear just how innocent he was, and I'm not sure if there was any evidence that would lead an armchair detective to figure out who, in fact, dunnit. I generally dislike murder mysteries in which the narrative departs from the usual point of view to show the story from the killer's angle; on the whole I'd rather stay with the hunters full time. When the breaks turn out to be not so much a red herring as a red humpback whale, I just feel like Dame Agatha was snickering up her cardigan sleeve at me. All in all, though, this was more fun than I expected, and made me glad I've picked up a healthy stock of Christies to fill in any gaps in my reading schedule. As if there were any of those.

[arielfl · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This was one of the lingering books I hadn't gotten to yet from the cool down with A.C. challenge this summer. I am so glad that I finally got to it. Usually Hercule Poirot annoys me but I kind of liked him in this one. This was a fast paced mystery coming in at around 200 pages. In this book we find Hercule Poirot challenged by a killer through letters sent to him. He must stop the killer before he commits another murder based on the alphabetical letter of the victim's name. Of course the killer's downfall is that he thinks he can outsmart Poirot. Let's just say that it doesn't took many letters for Poirot to figure the killer's identity. Like most of Christie's books I didn't have the solution figured out. The wrap ups are always so brilliant that I am always left wondering why I didn't put the clues together. This is another wonderful outing from the queen of crime that should leave Poirot fans especially pleased.

[bookpurring · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This one is truly one of my favorite Agatha books, it's in my opinion very modern. The conflict of having a serial killer is new for Poirot and makes the book current (as opposed to some other of the mysteries that wouldn't work in this day and era, though I do love them don' t get me wrong!)

[wildbill_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is the first Hercule Poirot book I have read and I enjoyed it very much. The book is in the same set as Drink to Yesterday. The book begins with Poirot receiving a letter signed A.B.C. The letter challenges Mr. Poirot's ability to solve a mystery from an event that will take place at Andover on the 21st of the month. Then on the 21st Mrs. Ascher is found murdered in her shop at Andover. Found on the counter of her shop is a railway guide known as the A.B.C.Mr. Poirot's companion in this book, his Doctor Watson, is Captain Arthur Hastings O.B.E. Poirot and Hastings go to Andover and begin investigating Mrs. Ascher's murder. The witnesses are a cross section of the English middle class. Poirot questions them thoroughly creating interesting dialogs reminiscent to me of Jack Webb in Dragnet.Poirot then receives a second letter predicting trouble in Bexhill on the 25th. The case has turned into a serial murder and Scotland Yard becomes involved. Inspector Crome takes charge of the case accompanied by a psychiatrist, Dr. Thompson.The victim in Bexhill is Elizabeth Bernard, strangled by her own belt. The A.B.C. guide is found beneath her body. Poirot now becomes focused on discovering the motive which will lead to the killer. The murder in Bexhill is followed by the murder of Sir Carmichael Clarke in Churston, preceded by the letter from A.B.C. Then George Earlfield is murdered in Doncaster on Septmember 11th in a movie theater. He is stabbed and the A.B.C. guide is left on the floor between his feet. Mr. Roger Downes is also found in the theater and it appears A.B.C. has made a mistake.After the murder in Doncaster a series of clues lead to Alexander Bonaparte Cust as the murderer. His room is searched and a quantity of A.B.C. guides are found. Mr. Cust is found and arrested. The only problem is that Mr. Cust has an alibi for the Bexhill murder.Hercule Poirot is still looking for the motive for the murders and has a meeting with Mr. Cust. Mr. Cust is a rather pitiful man. He failed to meet the expectations of his ambitious mother who saddled him with the names of glorious men. He was discharged from the Army when it was discovered he had epilepsy. Now he is plagued by headaches and memory loss from his epilepsy. Recently he had received a position selling stockings and maintained that the instructions of his employer had sent him to the cities where the murders were committed. He admits to Poirot that he committed the murders but cannot say why.The book ends with Poirot in a room with a group of the interested parties from the murders, the classic climax to a whodunit. Poirot proceeds to explain the crimes and names the murderer. The last scene is well done and contains interesting surprises.I understand why Agatha Christie had such a reputation as a mystery writer. The plot moves well and the book is full of interesting characters. The mystery and the ending are well done, surprising and believable.

[mmyoung_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The writers of current 'serial murderer' series would do well to read this Christie in which the author deconstructs much of the mystic around such murders.This superbly plotted book also plays very fairly with the reader. Those who read carefully will not be surprised by the 'final reveal.'

[Aqua · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I can't even get into the spectacular storytelling skills of Agatha Christie. The narrator here is the gem; bringing the characters to life with spectacular voices for each. Bravo!

[moonshineandrosefire · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The little Belgian detective exercises his "little grey cells" against a mysterious correspondent who writes to him predicting the murders of several people. Poirot is forewarned when the first two murder victims' names begin with an A and a B, now he must solve the case before the killer strikes again in an attempt to complete the alphabet. I must say that I enjoyed this book very much. I had first read this years ago but had forgotten who the murderer was and why he actually committed the murders. I give it an A!

[daniel5estes · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Monsieur Poirot and his team of Captain Hastings and the detectives from Scotland Yard are up against a serial murderer this time, and this one is killing sequentially and alphabetically. Does he (or she, as Poirot often points out) murder for fame or perhaps for some other sinister reason?The joy of this novel is more than unraveling the mystery. The real heart of the story is tagging along with the ever-witty and always self-assured Hercule Poirot as he "exercises the little grey cells." Watching the local authorities rush to judgment while Poirot seeks a deeper truth never fails to delight. And the brilliant Agatha Christie seems to give the reader that one missing piece of the puzzle, at just the right moment, to find out whodunit.

[mauveberry · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The ending was a bit unexpected, but I didn't enjoy this book as much as other Agatha Christies. I don't feel like the characters were as fleshed out as they usually are in her other books.