All About Agatha (Christie)

It's always a pleasure to commune with a legitimate Christie obsessive, and Ragnar is about as legit as they come. You may know him as one of the leading voices of contemporary noir, but he has also translated a number of Christie novels from English into his native Icelandic--starting at the tender age of seventeen, no less!

You can find out more about Ragnar and his work here, on his website. In particular, we discussed his most ...

Captains = good. Commanders = bad. Just two revelations made in the course of a very fun episode to research and record. I hope you enjoy. And happy Thanksgiving to all those in the United States!

Here is a link to Brad Friedman's brilliant blog post from 2022, about the military men of Christie.

You can now pre-order Sweet Spot, the third book ...

On this Veterans/Remembrance Day, I begin a two-episode series all about the veterans of Agatha Christie, starting with three real-life veterans who meant a great deal to our favorite author....

You can now pre-order Sweet Spot, the third book in my Ghostwriter Mysteries series! (Coming out July 2026.)

To visit and subscribe to the podcast's Patr...

Ghosts, second sight, and reincarnation, oh my! I hope you're ready for an extremely spooky tale of Christie's. (And yes, I am standing by the apostrophe in "Hallowe'en" and the "i" in "gipsy.") Enjoy... and Happy Hallowe'en!

Also, click here to enjoy, for free, my latest SPOOKTACULAR Patreon episode all about The Hound of the Baskervilles, by Arthur Conan Doyle! Should you wish to subscribe to Patreon, either monthly or yearly, us...

"For there is nothing lost, that may be found, if sought." Words of wisdom courtesy of Edmund Spenser (and Colonel Brandon, as played by the inimitable Alan Rickman, RIP). And I'm taking them to heart in this episode, as we get to discover two Christie television adaptations that were not readily available to us until quite recently, a Poirot and a Marple. It isn't often that I can say this, but: hooray for the Internet!

You can no...

Who doesn't love a puzzle? Maureen and Jay have gone *full bore* on the notion of a solvable Golden Age mystery. Call it a mashup between Agatha Christie and Dennis Wheatley's "crime dossiers" (if you know you know). I have a feeling many of you will enjoy the heck out of it.

You can check out the book, which is now available in the U.S. and UK, on Maureen's website here.

Here are those links I mentioned at the end of the episode t...

Rejoice: it is time for another live episode from the Agatha Christie Festival, in Christie's birthplace of Torquay! This time I braved the stage all by myself, to discuss Christie's use of true crime in her fiction. As usual, I had an absolute blast.

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Visit the podcast on Instagram...

Please enjoy this time capsule from early 2017, all about the real-life disappearance of our favorite author.... See (some of) you in England! Details below regarding my two appearances there.

I'll be appearing first, in London, 12-13 September, at Silent Echoes: Golden Age Crime Fiction and Trauma, hosted by Golden Age Mysteries and Florida State University's College of Communication & Information.

And then I'm heading down to the...

At long last, another episode about YA mystery! If you haven't yet heard of Marthe Jocelyn's Aggie Morton, Mystery Queen series, you are in for a treat....

Visit Marthe on her website, or on Instagram, or just check out the Aggie Morton books directly. Marthe wanted me to note that the illustrator is Is...

Riley Sager has been producing bestselling mystery thrillers with Christie-like consistency for nine years now. His latest, With a Vengeance, is his most Christie-like yet. It was a pleasure to speak with him about the book, Christie's influence, and what it's like to be a mystery writer in the world of publishing today.

You can visit Riley and peruse his prodigious output on his website here.

To visit and subscribe to the podcast'...

I could not be more thrilled to welcome back A+++ listener, and now two-time guest co-host, Helen Frank, to discuss the flesh-and-blood secretaries of Agatha Christie's life. We already covered the ones that Christie created for herself out of ink, so this episode is a completist's delight. So many secretaries!

For those of you in the SoCal area, consider purchasing tickets for Christie's adaptation of Towards Zero, directed by fo...

How has it taken me this long to talk about audiobooks?! Huge thanks to Gray Robert Brown, for his willingness to share his considerable expertise on this topic. Thank you also to Hugh Fraser, for the many, many hours he has spent speaking Agatha Christie's words into a microphone. We salute you, Captain Hastings.

You can find Gray at his website here, and if you aren't listening yet, please do check out his stupendous podcast The...

Steen Just is a Danish gentleman who is passionate about Agatha Christie--so much so that he has spent his retirement contributing hugely to the Danish-language Wikipedia articles on Agatha Christie. I had a great time talking with him about his unique perspective on our favorite author.

The following Christie titles are spoiled to some degree in this episode: By the Pricking of My Thumbs, Endless Night, Lord Edgware Dies, A Murder...

There's a decent chance you've heard about the recent online course put out by BBC Maestro, in which a digitally manipulated representation of Agatha Christie teaches the craft of writing a mystery. Yes, really! I was fortunate enough to sit down with the person responsible for all the research that went into this quite heavily researched project: Dr. Mark Aldridge. As many longtime listeners will kno...

When A+++ podcast listener Helen Frank contacted me about doing a themed episode on the secretaries of Agatha Christie, little did I know there would be so much to talk about. And little did she know that I would hoodwink her into co-hosting the episode in question! But I'm so glad I did. I think you'll be as well.

Loose Lips, the second book in my Ghostwriter Mysteries series, is current...

It was a delight to speak to Jeffrey Round--both about his work, and of course, about Agatha Christie. He is every bit as much of a Christie fan as me, and so many of you....

You can visit Jeffrey at his website, or check out his novel The Sulphur Springs Cure directly.

To visit and subscribe to the podcast's Patreon page, click here.

Loose Lips, the second book in my Ghostwriter Mysteries...

What fun it was to put together this roving episode of All About Agatha! Thanks again to Christopher Diehl for inviting me to A Poirot Double Bill. I'm already looking forward to his next Christie theatrical production.

Come see me this week, May 4th-9th, on my tour of the (U.S.) South! Click on my website for more details.

Visit and subscribe to the podcast's Patreon page.

You can still buy tickets for my upcoming appearance at t...

We've done so many Christies for Christmas, it's about time we did one for Easter. Alas, mutations from the radioactive byproduct of a 1960s-era nuclear power plant did not move me or my guest co-host the way Christie seems to have intended. But perhaps your mileage varies.

The following titles are spoiled to varying degrees in this episode: The Man from the Sea, The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side, The Murder at the Vicarage, Nem...

It isn't every day I get to interview a map designer on All About Agatha. Nor is it every day I get to work on a map with a map designer, which is something I've been doing on the side in tribute to my late co-host, Catherine Brobeck, whom Ben and I talk about at some length in our conversation. We also talk some Christie, because of course we do; I know Catherine wouldn't have had it any other way.

Visit my website for details on ...