Blurb:
‘I’d like to put my dear little pistol against her head and just pull the trigger.’
A cruise down the Nile on a river steamer sounds like the perfect way to get away from it all.
But the tranquil darkness of an Egyptian evening can change fast when the air is thick with hot passions and cold malice. Temperatures rise when the first passenger is shot, and Hercule Poirot must abandon the mysteries of ancient Egypt and focus on altogether deadlier matters…
My Review:
I was very excited to read this book. My first Agatha Christie novel was “Murder on the Orient Express”, and I wanted to read more of her works. However, I was disappointed with “Death on the Nile”. The book seemed slow and quite predictable.
The death only happens mid-way through the 373-page book, dividing the book into two halves.
The first half: It is just a character introduction. We learn about them, their personalities, and how they interact with each other in a closed setting. A lot of information shared here becomes relevant later. I believe that through the character interactions, a lot of information was already shared making it very easy to predict everyone’s motive to be the potential murderer. By page 130 (way before the murder, page 167), I was able to identify the potential motive and murderers for the murder that was yet to be committed. And, I would like to add that I was spot on.
The second half: A lot of suspects were introduced with relevant motives and grilled, to ultimately be declared clean, killed, or remain suspicious because there was still a long way to reach the end of the story. This led to the dragging of plots. Revelations that could have been the first reaction also came up quite late in the story.
Overall, I didn’t find any surprising elements or twists in the story. It seemed quite flat. No doubt, the ultimate motive was intriguing, but the execution lacked and the big reveal didn’t land well.
I am still quite hopeful about Agatha Christie’s work, and I hope my next pick would be more enjoyable.
SPOILER ALERT: I identified the murderer as soon as the first death was introduced. Maybe, now you will too!