Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

Hartastic t1_ixs9nbc wrote

I generally prefer Christie... usually, but not always, at the end of a Poirot novel I feel like I could have guessed the solution even if I didn't. This is pretty much what I'm looking for in a mystery.

I disagree a bit about the sidekicks -- Watson isn't as smart as Holmes but he at least has some useful skills -- Hastings is pretty much just an impulsive idiot. (Although this maybe is what makes Curtain so... well, I won't say more but it wouldn't work without Hastings being Hastings, even as an older man.)

21

confrita OP t1_ixwzmsh wrote

Yeah I get what you're saying about the feeling of the possible guessing of the solution at the end of Poirot's stories, and I suppose that's something Christie noted as a lacking in detective stories, giving the reader at least some little possibility or sensation of possibility of reaching to the culprit.

That is one of the main reasons that the stories of Ellery Queen (at least some of them) were a kind of novelty for me. There you have the direct challenge from the author to analyze the problem and trying to reach the conclusions before telling you the solution

3