The Sittaford Mystery audiobook

A stand alone without Miss Marple or Poirot.Major Burnaby attends a dinner party at the Willett's that gets out of hand when someone suggests they try table-turning to spice up the evening. Table-turning was what people used to do before ouija boards were all over the place.After the usual giggling and hijinks from some of the younger guests, the table spells out MURDER in reference to his friend, Captain Trevelyan. Naturally, the mood of the party is ruined by what is assumed to be a joke in very bad taste. But Burnaby, normally the pinnacle of English good sense, can't seem to quite shake it off and tells the group that he plans to walk to Trevelyan's home.Miles away. In a snowstorm. The stoic Burnaby ends up at the local police station to get help gaining entrance. They arrive at his old friend's house and discover what looks to be an attempted robbery and the body of Captain Trevelyan cooling on the floor. The time of death matches with the time the spirit spoke during the table-turning.Did Agatha write a horror story?Don't count on it.When Trevalyn's nephew, James Pearson, is arrested for his murder, Pearson's fiance decides to use her considerable skills to suss out the real killer. Is Emily Trefusis a professional detective? No. But she is the sort of girl who can get things done.She teams up with the young & hungry journalist Charles Enderby, who was just in town to give a prize to Major Burnaby for winning a contest with his newspaper. That he had the happy accident to stumble onto a murder case in progress and a beautiful damsel in distress was too good an opportunity to pass up.Although, she may be playing up the distress angle a bit...Together with the unflappable Inspector Narracott, they uncover the shocking truth behind who killed the old man and why.Another fun Christie mystery that turns everything you think you know on its head.Recommended!

This is a classic Agatha Christie where she makes you suspect most of the characters during the book and then it turns out to be the person you least suspected - and then it seems so obvious they did it. How does she do this and how come I didn't spot the clues?The writing is so effortless and simple to read. There's a little love mystery in the book too. I find myself reading her books from beginning to end in perhaps four installments - what a pity I have to sleep, eat, and go to work!

Agatha Christie does it again.No Marple or Poirot in this one. Instead, Emily Trefusis is our plucky heroine. Christie adores creating a smart, attractive, sharp female character. Emily is determined to get her fiancée, James Pearson, out of jail. He's accused of murder - but Emily knows there's no way he could have done it. "Jim is a frightful idiot. But he doesn't murder people.”Once again, Christie's wit and humor blow me away. She is such a funny writer! I would almost classify her books as comedies. Of course, Sittaford is populated with a number of colorful characters. A curmudgeon of an old military man who is perpetually grumpy. Another military man who's an invalid. He's always complaining about 'civilized people' and their tendency to hurry. He's got the hots for young Emily and claims she needs a “real man”, meaning himself – even though he's thirty years her senior. There's the old woman invalid, a sharp-witted nosy busybody in the vein of Miss Marple who knows all the goings-on. There's the young man, Charles Enderby, a journalist who is helping Emily to solve the case – while falling hard for her. Inspector Narracott, the clever and resourceful policeman assigned to the case. Mrs. Willett and her daughter Violet – who very suspiciously moved to Sittaford's cold winter climate from sunny South Africa – if what they say is true. Etc. etc.Another gem in this novel is Christie's choice to start out the mystery with a 'table turning'. This 'old-style' form of playing Ouija board involves six or so people sitting at a table and asking spirits to 'knock' on the table to indicate 'yes', 'no', and letters of the alphabet. The ghost tells the players of the murder. Of course, there's no real supernatural element and everything is explained to satisfaction by the end.The vocabulary was wonderful. Also worth noting was the mountain of 1931 slang that was colorful and highly amusing.Emily Trefusis is a gem – plucky, smart, funny – and able to get any man, woman or child to do what she wants through subtle manipulation, praise and occasional tears. Her tactics work wonders on all – especially the hapless males who cross her path. She has no less than 4 men chasing after her in this novel. Actually, Christie creates a brilliant and gradual love triangle with Emily, the jailed Pearson, and the intrepid reporter Enderby. Who will Emily choose? I was on tenterhooks wondering how this triangle was going to resolve itself.Last but not least, Christie fooled me again. I never suspected the true murderer in the least. I was shocked. My two or three running theories and suspicions were all for naught. It's very rare that I'm able to solve a Christie novel correctly and this one is no exception.YA novels with Mary Sues and love triangles have NOTHING on Christie's Mary Sue of Emily and her intense yet chaste love triangle in this novel. These Agatha Christie novels were probably the very thing teenagers were consuming by the dozen in 1931. Pretending to be Emily Trefusis instead of Katniss Everdeen.Published as Murder at Hazelmoor OR The Sittaford Mystery.

I am really enjoying Agatha Christie novels! I like the way she has a sly laugh at crime detection. I like the way she includes red herrings. I like the way I can’t work out the culprit, dammit! I even like the 1920s language, and laughing at the cultural norms of the time and wondering what on earth Christie would make of life in 2017.

2021 Review:The Sittaford Mystery (or The Murder at Hazelmoor), a standalone by the Queen of Crime, first published in 1931, is a quite perfect read for the season with a murder in a snowed-in English village difficult to navigate, a fair few suspects, and a touch of spookiness!Our story opens in the small village of Sittaford in Dartmoor, where a retired Navyman, Captain Joe Trevelyan had built six cottages, one, Sittaford House for himself and five others which he has sold to others, among them his best friend Major Burnaby. Captain Trevelyan is very fond of money and never loses an opportunity to make some, so when Mrs Willet and her daughter, Violet, recently arrived from South Africa, offer to rent his home, the Captain is happy to oblige and himself moves to a smaller house, Hazelmoor down the hill in Exhampton, making a tidy profit. The Willets who are fairly social invite others from Sittaford for tea and bridge, and among their guests is Major Burnaby. For entertainment, one of the guests suggests a ‘table turning’. But after some fun messages, one of the ‘ghosts’ that visits them announces that Captain Trevelyan is dead—murdered, leaving all the guests unsettled. Major Burnaby is shaken as well, and decides to walk down to Trevelyan’s cottage (despite the impending snowstorm) and take a look. He finds that Trevelyan has in fact been murdered.The police led by Inspector Narracott investigate. It seems at first that the Captain had no enemies, but it emerges that he was tight with his money because of which many in his own family bore him grudges. Soon his nephew James Pearson, who was in the village at the time (and had in fact visited Trevelyan to seek a loan) is arrested. But James’ fiancée Emily Trefusis knows he is innocent (for he doesn’t have the guts to kill) and teams up with enterprising reporter Charles Enderby to prove James innocent. The two begin to talk to Trevelyan’s relations and others in the village, and uncover some secrets. But do they track down the killer?This was an enjoyable mystery with plenty of subplots and red herrings to throw one off track. Since this was a reread for me, I knew whodunit (I don’t think I guessed the first time around), and was keeping a look out for clues. Christie is fair and does give us various hints along the way. One incident though seemed the result of chance or coincidence, though, and I am not sure how things would have played out without it. But still, I had forgotten some of the subplots and threads, so it was interesting to follow those.In the book Christie also gives us plenty of interesting characters. In Emily Trefusis we have a rather spunky Christie heroine, who undertakes to travel to isolated and snowed-in Sittaford and solve the mystery on her own. She uses not only her intelligence (which she has plenty of) and also ability to manipulate people (Charles, in particular) to do her bidding to manage to speak to various people involved and get help in the things she can’t do on her own. With Emily’s story we also have a romance thread, and a bit of a mystery as to whom she will pick for more than one character becomes interested in her. Another standout was the intelligent invalid lady Mis Percehouse, who might have a sharp tongue but turns out quite a likeable person. She takes to and helps Emily (she also has a bunch of cats, one of whom is called the Emperor of Peru).But while Emily is investigating, Inspector Narracott isn’t turned into a background character, nor the typical policeman in mysteries who is lost or clueless. He too is fairly sharp and uncovers plenty of information; both investigations proceed side-by-side, complementing each other.While not among Christie’s best mysteries, this was one I enjoyed a lot, for its atmosphere, characters, and plot too (aside form a few niggles). 3.75 stars 2017 ReviewMajor Burnaby who has gone to visit with his neighbours the Willets finds himself participating in “tableturning” but after a harmless bit of fun, the “spirits” inform them that Captain Tevelyan has been murdered. Navy Captain Joe Trevelyan had retired to the small village of Sittaford in Dartmoor where he built six houses, one of which he occupied himself, and the rest sold to others, among them Major Burnaby his closest friend. The Captain’s only flaws seem reclusiveness and a fondness for money, the latter having led him to let his own house to the Willets for the winter and take up residence elsewhere. When Major Burnaby trudges through the thick snow to put himself at ease and ensure Trevelyan is safe, he finds that the séance was in fact right, and the Captain has been murdered. Captain Trevelyan had no enemies but was a very rich man, so of course those who stand to inherit are in the net of suspicion. When the police find his nephew James Pearson visited him just around the time the incident happened and was desperate for money, they are not long in arresting him. But Jim’s fiancé, Emily Trefusis knows even if he isn’t straightforward in all his dealings, he is not capable of murder and sets out to clear his name, along the way enlisting the help of journalist Charles Enderby who was in Sittaford for another purpose but jumps at the chance of the scoop of a lifetime. Emily is a very likeable heroine full of spunk and gumption, she knows what she needs to do and gets it done, not being above a bit of manipulation. Charles Enderby is eager to be of assistance (even when it means being outdoors in the middle of the night in frozen weather) and even the Inspector is happy to oblige with information which he wouldn’t probably reveal to any other. It was great fun “watching” Emily as she approaches the Captain’s relations and Sittaford residents finding out all she needs to know, and some that she probably doesn’t. Miss Percehouse was another character I thought good fun, shrewd and also in some ways like Emily, despite being an invalid.As is usual with Christie, there are various plotlines side by side. Everyone has something to hide but which of these has something to do with Captain Trevelyan’s murder? One pretty much needs to read to the end to find out. This was another one where I didn’t guess the murderer or the motive, for that matter. (I tried thinking up the most fantastic solution I could come up with, but it turned out to be just that, and completely wrong, though there was a “secret” in that quarter as well). The atmosphere is icy, there are secrets galore, even an escaped convict loose on the moors, all together making for very entertaining reading.

Another blockbuster from the pen of Agatha Christie. This novel has the most eerie beginning amongst all her novels. The development of the plot is slow in the beginning but it soon picks up pace and you just cannot out it down in last hundred pages. And in the end when the murderer is revealed you are left wondering as to why you did not think of that before.

Agatha Christie has been my favorite author since I was 9 and read my first Hercule Poirot novel (It was The Mysterious Affair at Styles, in case anybody is curious). I bought a box set of Poirot paperbacks at a garage sale for the exorbitant price of $4 (and spent a lot of time mowing the lawn that summer to pay my mom back for giving me the cash to buy books!) and was whisked away into Christie's golden age mystery world of waxed moustaches, sinister plots and murders at country estates. :) Flash forward mumble-mumble-ahem years, and I still LOVE Christie's style and characters. I always wanted to read all of Christie's writing....but could never find a comprehensive list. Back in the pre-internet days, I lived in a small town in BFE Kansas that had no bookshop and a very small library. I made a list of her novels using book lists in paperbacks I bought...and found many of her books over the years. I have a shelf filled with old, disheveled but much loved, paperbacks. But I could never find them all. And some were published under multiple titles....making it really rough to tell what book was actually which. :) But.....the internet is a wonderful tool....and I've finally started on my quest to read my way through Christie. In publication order (as best I can, with some backtracking when I find I have gone off track) and much meandering down rabbit holes when necessary (references to historical events, places, or phrases/language that is dated by almost 100 years of time passing). I'm loving it! I had to smile when I reached The Sittaford Mystery in my travels through Christie. This is a Christie novel that I had never read before. And not only that, it was the first Christie novel to be published under one title in the US and another in the UK. In 1931, the book was published in the United States as The Murder at Hazelmoor. Later that year, the book was published in the UK as The Sittaford Mystery. This story doesn't feature one of Christie's well-known detectives, but instead focuses on a group of people in two English villages following a blizzard. Throw in a supernatural element -- a session of "Table-Turning'' that hints at a murder -- and Christie weaves an interesting tale of cold, winter murder! Very entertaining mystery! I liked the fact that the characters were just randoms thrown in together and not Poirot/Marple, etc. This particular plot worked better that way. I listened to the audio book version of this story. Narrated by Hugh Fraser (who played Hastings in the Poirot television series), the audio is about 6.5 hours long. Fraser does an excellent job of narrating! I went down a bit of a rabbit hole on this one.... Table Turning. Before oujia boards became all the rage, spiritualists, magicians and charletans used table turning to contact the spirit world. Participants would sit around the table and when there was a spirit with a message, they would speak the alphabet waiting for the table to dip or move at the correct letter. Movement of the table or even raps were used as signals. Definitely a fun and easily manipulated parlor trick for amusement. Christie, of course, turned it to sinister, murderous ends! The television series Agatha Christie's Marple adapted this story in Season 2, Episode 4. I had never watched the show before....so was very interested to check it out. Jane Marple is played by Geraldine McEwan. I liked her portrayal of the character, but was disappointed in the episode. Significant changes to the plot were made....so many in fact that it really is no longer the same story. Ick. The story is great the way Christie wrote it --- why mangle it just to add Miss Marple in the mix?? It could easily have been kept mostly intact and Marple still interjected into the investigation....but they made major plot changes. Boo!Moving on to the next book in my Christie adventure: Peril at End House! Hercule Poirot!

This is my favorite Agatha Christie so far. The cast of characters is vast and so many are made real to us without bogging down the arc of the mystery. When Miss Emily T was introduced, I was thoroughly engaged. She was most definitely the star of the show. It was such fun to view her journey with the reporter as they set about to find answers juxtaposed with the Inspector assigned to the case. A big thank you to Ruth Ware for recommending this snowy mystery to her fan club members. Highly recommended!