Book Report: And Then There Were None

OK, for any Gentle Reader who has not yet read or seen Ten Little Indians, AKA And Then There Were None (New York: Pocket 1979), let me start by saying it was the judge. The JUDGE! OK?

Secondly, Agatha Christie cheats! There are at least two places where she goes into the Judge's thoughts, and they make no sense except as a way to decieve the reader. Starting on the first freaking page.

First, the judge “went over in his mind all that had appeared in the papers about Indian Island.” Why the heck would he do that? He owns the place. Then he takes out a letter purporting to be from an old acquaintance but which he actually wrote and sent to himself. Then, having “cast back in his mind to remember when exactly he had last seen Lady Constance Culmington,” he concludes that she, as “he reflected to himself, was exactly the sort of woman who would buy an island [...]” She didn’t, of course; he did. The only possible explanation for this train of thought would be if he were testing out the cover story, trying to make sure that it’s plausible. Only ... um ... none of the other people coming to the island have ever met or heard of Lady Constance Culmington. And he knows this: he’s carefully selected the guests and researched them in unlikely detail (for the pre-internet era).

So, really, the only reason for him to be thinking this way is if he knows that we’re reading his mind, and he wants to trick us. I’m just saying, Ms. Christie is a CHEATER!

Other than the cheating, though, it’s a terrific book.

By the way, that’s a spoiler, up there. If you want a spoiler-free comment, this summary does such a good job of misdirection and obfuscation that, um, well, it’s as if it were a summary of a different book altogether. How’s that?

                           ,
-Vardibidian.