Most of the other reviewers have it right - this book is a disaster. I'd have given it no stars, but I wasn't given the choice. One reviewer admires Christie for tryng something new. It's a good thing she didn't write this book first because she'd have never gotten it published. It's awful in every way; plot development, character development, prose style. I especially hated Christie's constant harangue as she bangs away at some notion of fascists taking over the world through the youth of the planet, a plot financed by the monied industrial types, and what that evil portends for the future of the world, mankind, womankind, and anyone else who happens to walk onto the stage. What's worse? She says it over and over and over and....You want good Christie? Read "Hercule Poirot's Christmas!"