Title: The Big Four (Hercule Poirot #5)
Author: Agatha Christie
First published: 1927
Category: Mystery
Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
Add: Goodreads
Purchase: Amazon | IndieBound | Book Depository
I’ve read many of Agatha Christie’s books over the years, she’s one of my favorites, and I felt like reading a Poirot mystery, well listening to one actually. I chose poorly with The Big Four. Poirot is his usual dapper self, eccentric and fastidious. He’s as vain as always, but with faithful Hastings as the narrator, he doesn’t become overly-egocentric. Hastings humanizes him some, makes fun of his quirks and appreciates his friendship.
But the mystery here let me down. It’s too big, but not big enough. The audio version, read by Hugh Fraser, comes in at only 5 hours and 33 minutes. There’s just not enough room for that kind of world domination conspiracy, and even if it were, it’s just too cartoonish, with the stereotypical criminals, the matermind Chinese man, the multimillionaire American, the brilliant French scientist and, and their assassin, the elusive “Number Four,” and their secret meetings. The “twists and turns” are silly, unbelievable or both. It’s not the smooth mystery, where Poirot works through everything using his “little grey cells,” and then has a denoument scene at the end where he spells out the solution. Instead, it’s more a series of episodes, each having some connection to the Big Four.
After I hit post for this review, I’m going to just forget I read it. It’s not up to Christie’s usual work.
Hercule Poirot Series
- The Mysterious Affair at Styles
- The Murder on the Links
- Poirot Investigates [SS]
- The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
- The Big Four
- The Mystery of the Blue Train
- The Under Dog and Other Stories [SS]
- Peril at End House
- Lord Edgeware Dies (APA: Thirteen at Dinner)
- Murder in Three Acts (APA: Three-Act Tragedy)
- Murder on the Orient Express ( APA: Murder on the Calais Coach )
- Death in the Clouds ( APA: Death in the Air)
- The ABC Murders (APA: The Alphabet Murders)
- Murder in Mesopotamia
- Cards on the Table
- Dumb Witness (APA: Poirot Loses a Client)
- Death on the Nile
- Murder in the Mews [SS] (APA: Dead Man’s Mirror)
- Appointment with Death
- Hercule Poirot’s Christmas (APA: Murder for Christmas and A Holiday for Murder)
- One, Two, Buckle My Shoe (APA: The Patriotic Murders and An Overdose of Death)
- Sad Cypress
- Evil Under the Sun
- Five Little Pigs (APA: Murder in Retrospect)
- The Hollow (APA: Murder After Hours)
- Taken at the Flood (APA: There is a Tide…)
- The Labors of Hercules [SS]
- Mrs. McGinty’s Dead (APA: Blood Will Tell)
- After the Funeral (APA: Funerals Are Fatal and Murder at the Gallop)
- Hickory, Dickory, Dock (APA: Hickory, Dickory, Death)
- Dead Man’s Folly
- Cat Among the Pigeons
- The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding and Selection of Entrees [SS]
- The Clocks
- Third Girl
- Hallowe’en Party
- Elephants Can Remember
- Hercule Poirot’s Early Cases [SS]
- Curtain: Hercule Poirot’s Last Case
- Hercule Poirot’s Casebook: Fifty Stories [SS]
Even though you did not like this book, I am glad you reviewed it. I have a goal of reading one Agatha Christie a month and maybe eventually all of them. I want to start with recommended books first, although I am going roughly in order.
I’d skip this one, I think, if I were you.
I’ve only read one of Christie’s books and it didn’t wow me, so I know how you feel.
Yeah, this isn’t Christie’s best Poirot, unfortunately. It’s been a long time since I read it, but I do remember that it’s not my favorite.
Not all Christie novels featuring Poirot are equally good. I am pretty sure I read this one but I don’t remember anything either…
I have read some Agatha but it was soooo long ago that I’m sure I wouldn’t remember any of it! This one doesn’t sound like a winner!
Lynn 😀
I used to read alot of Agatha Christie and I like the Poirot mysteries. Too bad this was a miss, thanks for the honest review.
Too bad. I suppose when you have written as many books as Christie has, they can’t all be winners…
Carol, I have added your review to the Agatha Christie Blog Carnival for February and would be glad to have any contributions from you: http://acrccarnival.blogspot.com.au/2013/02/acrc-carnival-2013-2-february.html
Thanks Kerrie.
I’m not a huge fan of this either…. I think it was one of her earlier attempts at an espionage type plotline, and it shows. I like her Tommy & Tuppence books a lot better for this kind of story. Though, if I remember right, this is the book we meet Poirot’s “brother.”
Yeah, he uses his “twin” for a bit. And love Tommy and Tuppence.