Agatha Christie

Agatha Christie was an English writer. She is one of the world's most famous authors of detective fiction. She is also considered the Grand lady of the detective. Works by Agatha Christie became one of the most published in the history of humanity.

She has published more than 60 detective novels, 6 psychological novels and 19 collections of short stories. 16 of her plays were put in the theatres of London. Agatha Christie's books have been published in more than 4 billion copies and translated into more than 100 languages.

Agatha received a good home education. She started reading when she was five and at that age she also tried to write poems. At the age of eighteen, she entertained herself by writing short stories, some of which were published in revised form.

In 1920 her first novel
The Mysterious Affair at Styles was published. There is an assumption that the reason Christie turned to the detective was a dispute with the older sister Madge. Agatha wanted to prove that she would be able to create something worthy of publication.

Here are the most popular quotes from this work:

“You gave too much rein to your imagination. Imagination is a good servant, and a bad master. The simplest explanation is always the most likely.”

“An appreciative listener is always stimulating.”

“Every murderer is probably somebody's old friend.”

“You know, Emily was a selfish old woman in her way. She was very generous, but she always wanted a return. She never let people forget what she had done for them - and, that way she missed love.”

“Miss Howard: Like a good detective story myself. Lots of nonsense written, though. Criminal discovered in last Chapter. Everyone dumbfounded. Real crime - you'd know at once.”

― Agatha Christie, The Mysterious Affair at Styles


Agatha Christie was not afraid to touch on social issues in her works. For example, at least two of Christy's novels "Five Pigs" and “Test of Innocence" described cases of miscarriages of justice related to the death penalty. In General, many of Christy's books describe the various negative aspects of the English justice of the time.

Unlike today's detectives, in her works there are practically no scenes of violence, pools of blood and rudeness. “The detective story was moral. Like everyone who wrote and read these books, I was against the criminal and for the innocent victim. No one could think that the time would come when detective stories would be read because of the scenes of violence described in them, for the sake of getting sadistic pleasure from cruelty for the sake of cruelty... ” ― she wrote in her autobiography. In her opinion, such scenes dull the feeling of compassion and do not allow the reader to focus on the main theme of the novel.