The latest in this classic unabridged Agatha Christie audio collection, read by Hugh Fraser. It is Christmas Eve. The Lee family reunion is shattered by a deafening crash of furniture, followed by a high-pitched wailing scream. Upstairs, the tyrannical Simeon Lee lies dead in a pool of blood, his throat slashed. But when Hercule Poirot, who is staying in the village with a friend for Christmas, offers to assist, he finds an atmosphere not of mourning but of mutual suspicion. It seems everyone had their own reason to hate the old man...
Ariadne Oliver, Queen of Crime Fiction, has been asked to devise a Murder Hunt for a fete at Nasse House, the home of Sir George Stubbs. But she begins to suspect that someone is manipulating the scenario of her game and fears that something very sinister is being planned. She sends for her old friend Hercule Poirot. At first he is not inclined to take her very seriously, but soon, a series of events propels him to change his mind.
The most beloved characters by the most popular crime writer of all timetogether in her largest compendium of stories ever. Agatha Christie is the worlds most popular writer in modern times and her books have only been outsold by the Bible and Shakespeare. Best remembered for such classic crime novels as Murder on the Orient Express, And Then There Were None, and Death on the Nile, her works have been cherished by generations of readers. Christie, however, was also a master of the shorter crime story and this volume collects some of her finest short pieces. Each of these thirty-nine stories features one of Christies famous detectives Miss Marple, Hercule Poirot, Parker Pyne, and Harley Quinin some of their most baffling and intriguing cases, as these ingenious Christie tales show how satisfying and compelling the crime short story can be.
This is the very first Poirot/Hastings story. Set in 1916, we meet Captain Hastings as he is invalided out of the Great War and goes to convalesce at Styles Court, the family home of his great friend, John Cavendish. By an extraordinary coincidence, billeted in the village is a brilliant little retired detective with an egg-shaped head, who made a considerable impression on the Captain when he was in Belgium. Styles is not a happy household and in the blistering summer heat, tensions mount. Even so, the tragic murder, which occurs is not expected. The entire family is drawn into the case but with their reluctant permission, Hastings calls upon the services of the diminutive Belgian.
!["The Mysterious Affair at Styles" by Agatha Christie [A BBC RADIO 4 FULL-CAST DRAMATISATION]](http://englishtips.org/uploads/posts/2011-07/1309840168_1171819502_actmas.jpg "\"The Mysterious Affair at Styles\" by Agatha Christie [A BBC RADIO 4 FULL-CAST DRAMATISATION]")
!["Hercule Poirot's Christmas" by Agatha Christie [A BBC RADIO 4 FULL-CAST DRAMATISATION]](http://englishtips.org/uploads/posts/2013-06/1371680581_1170982707_achpcbbc.jpg "\"Hercule Poirot's Christmas\" by Agatha Christie [A BBC RADIO 4 FULL-CAST DRAMATISATION]")
