4.50 from Paddington (Agatha Christie) [Paperback]

‘A model detective story, there is never a dull moment.’ The Times

'The suspense is agonising.' Daily Mail

'Miraculously fresh from a vintage pen.' Sunday Dispatch

‘Without the female of the species, indeed, detective fiction would be in a bad way. Miss Christie never harrows her readers, being content to intrigue and amuse them.’ Times Literary Supplement

'The great mistress of the last-minute switch is at it again… even the experts have given up any attempts to out-guess Miss Christie.' New Yorker

‘Precisely what one expects: the most delicious bamboozling possible in a babble of bright talk and a comprehensive bristle of suspicion all adeptly managed to keep you much too alert elsewhere to see the neat succession of clues that catch a murderer we never so much as thought of.’ New York Herald Tribune

Agatha Christie’s audacious mystery thriller, reissued with a striking new cover designed to appeal to the latest generation of Agatha Christie fans and book lovers.

For an instant the two trains ran together, side by side. In that frozen moment, Elspeth witnessed a murder. Helplessly, she stared out of her carriage window as a man remorselessly tightened his grip around a woman’s throat. The body crumpled. Then the other train drew away.

But who, apart from Miss Marple, would take her story seriously? After all, there were no suspects, no other witnesses… and no corpse.

Elspeth McGillicuddy is not a woman usually given to hallucinations. But when she witnesses what appears to be a woman being strangled on a train and no one else sees it, no one reports it and no corpse is found she turns to her old friend Jane Marple to help solve the puzzle. Miss Marple asks her highly efficient and intelligent young acquaintance Lucy Eyelesbarrow, to infiltrate the Crackenthorpe family, who seem to be at the heart of the mystery, and help unmask a murderer. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

For an instant the two trains ran together, side by side. In that frozen moment, Elspeth witnessed a murder. Helplessly, she stared out of her carriage window as a man remorselessly tightened his grip around a woman’s throat. The body crumpled. Then the other train drew away.

But who, apart from Miss Marple, would take her story seriously? After all, there were no suspects, no other witnesses… and no corpse.

“Never a dull moment.”
THE TIMES

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Agatha Christie was born in Torquay in 1890 and became, quite simply, the best-selling novelist in history. Her first novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, written towards the end of the First World War, introduced us to Hercule Poirot, who was to become the most popular detective in crime fiction since Sherlock Holmes. She is known throughout the world as the Queen of Crime. Her books have sold over a billion copies in the English language and another billion in over 100 foreign countries. She is the author of 80 crime novels and short story collections, 19 plays, and six novels under the name of Mary Westmacott.