What do you think?
Rate this book
Starring Miss Marple: A Murder is Announced / The Body in the Library / Murder With Mirrors
A collection of three Miss Marple novels by the inimitable Agatha Christie.
It contains the following stories:
1. "The Body in the Library,"
2. "A Murder is Announced," and
3. "Murder With Mirrors" (full title: "They Do It with Mirrors").
Librarian's note: this entry is for the collection< "Starring Miss Marple." Entries of each of the twelve novels and twenty short stories in the Miss Marple series can be found elsewhere on Goodreads.
It contains the following stories:
1. "The Body in the Library,"
2. "A Murder is Announced," and
3. "Murder With Mirrors" (full title: "They Do It with Mirrors").
Librarian's note: this entry is for the collection< "Starring Miss Marple." Entries of each of the twelve novels and twenty short stories in the Miss Marple series can be found elsewhere on Goodreads.
628 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2000
7 people are currently reading
462 people want to read
About the author
Agatha Christie
5,812 books75.1k followersAgatha Christie also wrote romance novels under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott, and was occasionally published under the name Agatha Christie Mallowan.
Dame Agatha Mary Clarissa Christie, Lady Mallowan, DBE (née Miller) was an English writer known for her 66 detective novels and 14 short story collections, particularly those revolving around fictional detectives Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple. She also wrote the world's longest-running play, the murder mystery The Mousetrap, which has been performed in the West End of London since 1952. A writer during the "Golden Age of Detective Fiction", Christie has been called the "Queen of Crime". She also wrote six novels under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott. In 1971, she was made a Dame (DBE) by Queen Elizabeth II for her contributions to literature. Guinness World Records lists Christie as the best-selling fiction writer of all time, her novels having sold more than two billion copies.
This best-selling author of all time wrote 66 crime novels and story collections, fourteen plays, and six novels under a pseudonym in romance. Her books sold more than a billion copies in the English language and a billion in translation. According to Index Translationum, people translated her works into 103 languages at least, the most for an individual author. Of the most enduring figures in crime literature, she created Hercule Poirot and Miss Jane Marple. She atuhored The Mousetrap, the longest-running play in the history of modern theater.
Associated Names:
Agata Christie
Agata Kristi
Агата Кристи (Russian)
Агата Крісті (Ukrainian)
Αγκάθα Κρίστι (Greek)
アガサ クリスティ (Japanese)
阿嘉莎·克莉絲蒂 (Chinese)
Dame Agatha Mary Clarissa Christie, Lady Mallowan, DBE (née Miller) was an English writer known for her 66 detective novels and 14 short story collections, particularly those revolving around fictional detectives Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple. She also wrote the world's longest-running play, the murder mystery The Mousetrap, which has been performed in the West End of London since 1952. A writer during the "Golden Age of Detective Fiction", Christie has been called the "Queen of Crime". She also wrote six novels under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott. In 1971, she was made a Dame (DBE) by Queen Elizabeth II for her contributions to literature. Guinness World Records lists Christie as the best-selling fiction writer of all time, her novels having sold more than two billion copies.
This best-selling author of all time wrote 66 crime novels and story collections, fourteen plays, and six novels under a pseudonym in romance. Her books sold more than a billion copies in the English language and a billion in translation. According to Index Translationum, people translated her works into 103 languages at least, the most for an individual author. Of the most enduring figures in crime literature, she created Hercule Poirot and Miss Jane Marple. She atuhored The Mousetrap, the longest-running play in the history of modern theater.
Associated Names:
Agata Christie
Agata Kristi
Агата Кристи (Russian)
Агата Крісті (Ukrainian)
Αγκάθα Κρίστι (Greek)
アガサ クリスティ (Japanese)
阿嘉莎·克莉絲蒂 (Chinese)
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
July 30, 2022
This review is for The Body in the Library, the third cozy mystery book in the Miss Marple series, written by Agatha Christie in 1942. I read this book at least once in the past, and even wrote a very brief review on Goodreads in 2017 when I was on a quest to write something for every book I'd previously read. Now I'm on a different quest: the April 2018 Agatha Christie Readathon where this book was selected as my "re-read" book in the challenge. I'll also say what I wrote the first time around was so laughable, I'm shocked at myself. It was useless, but that won't be the case today!
If push came to shove, I think I'm more of a fan of Miss Marple's detection style yet I prefer Hercule Poirot as a character. Marple is wonderful and I enjoy everything I've read with her as the main detective, but she lacks a little pizzazz to jolt you along the path. In this caper, a good friend of hers wakes up to find a dead body in her library. Neither her husband, guests, or servants recognize the young girl. It appears like her husband is the guilty party and when news spreads around town, the investigation begins. Suspects ran the gamut of an older gentlemen that the dead girl was growing close to, especially when he is ~50 years her senior. He thought of her as his adopted daughter, even choosing to leave her some money. Everyone believed him to be a fool and her to be a gold-digger. Maybe it was his son-in-law and daughter-in-law who stood to inherit less once he had passed away. Or was it the playboy filmmaker known for dabbling with slightly younger women. Throw in a complicated dance arrangement, a secret marriage, and a few more potential leads, including a side-plot where a car goes missing and another young girl turns up dead, then you've got quite a forehead-squisher of a story.
Christie never fails to astound me with the ingenuity behind each of the plots. You think you know everything, and one or two details don't exactly line up, but you just can't solve the puzzle. The clues are generally all out there, just masked in such a way that you have to work hard to guess what's slightly off. Marple always picks up on it, much to the dismay of the police investigation team. 'Marple's just a doddering old fool who gets lucky sometimes. She's a biddy putting her nose in places where it doesn't belong.' But you see, dear investigators... it does belong because she always finds her criminals before you do.
Exploration of fraud, loss, money problems, and guilt are the top of the suspect list this time. Someone's lying, and while it may see obvious at first, suspicion is cast in every direction. The story flows easily, even if you feel sometimes you're being taking on a tour of the unknown. It's that very path that winds you up while you're learning all the facts, then drops you off a swirling abyss of options. One by one, the alibis are proven fake or real... the past secrets come to light... and the true notions of an evil mind begin to materialize. That's why I love the cozy mystery but in particular the Grand Dame's approach to delivering the story. Little by little, not in any massive way, but enough the needle moves ever so slightly until it begins to dance in front of you upon landing at the final solution. I'm so excited to read another Marple next week: Murder at the Vicarage!
If push came to shove, I think I'm more of a fan of Miss Marple's detection style yet I prefer Hercule Poirot as a character. Marple is wonderful and I enjoy everything I've read with her as the main detective, but she lacks a little pizzazz to jolt you along the path. In this caper, a good friend of hers wakes up to find a dead body in her library. Neither her husband, guests, or servants recognize the young girl. It appears like her husband is the guilty party and when news spreads around town, the investigation begins. Suspects ran the gamut of an older gentlemen that the dead girl was growing close to, especially when he is ~50 years her senior. He thought of her as his adopted daughter, even choosing to leave her some money. Everyone believed him to be a fool and her to be a gold-digger. Maybe it was his son-in-law and daughter-in-law who stood to inherit less once he had passed away. Or was it the playboy filmmaker known for dabbling with slightly younger women. Throw in a complicated dance arrangement, a secret marriage, and a few more potential leads, including a side-plot where a car goes missing and another young girl turns up dead, then you've got quite a forehead-squisher of a story.
Christie never fails to astound me with the ingenuity behind each of the plots. You think you know everything, and one or two details don't exactly line up, but you just can't solve the puzzle. The clues are generally all out there, just masked in such a way that you have to work hard to guess what's slightly off. Marple always picks up on it, much to the dismay of the police investigation team. 'Marple's just a doddering old fool who gets lucky sometimes. She's a biddy putting her nose in places where it doesn't belong.' But you see, dear investigators... it does belong because she always finds her criminals before you do.
Exploration of fraud, loss, money problems, and guilt are the top of the suspect list this time. Someone's lying, and while it may see obvious at first, suspicion is cast in every direction. The story flows easily, even if you feel sometimes you're being taking on a tour of the unknown. It's that very path that winds you up while you're learning all the facts, then drops you off a swirling abyss of options. One by one, the alibis are proven fake or real... the past secrets come to light... and the true notions of an evil mind begin to materialize. That's why I love the cozy mystery but in particular the Grand Dame's approach to delivering the story. Little by little, not in any massive way, but enough the needle moves ever so slightly until it begins to dance in front of you upon landing at the final solution. I'm so excited to read another Marple next week: Murder at the Vicarage!
March 20, 2009
A Murder is Announced: * * * * *
Easily the best of the three. A clever opening gambit: a notice is posted in the local newspaper saying that Letitia Blacklock will die at a given date and time. The whole village, being morbidly curious, shows up at her house to see the action. There's an attempted robbery -- and the robber ends up dead. But the question remains: who would want to kill Letitia, and how will they try again? First-class story, plenty of room to keep guessing, some amusing characters, and the solution was not easy to predict, at least for me.
The Body in the Library * * * 1/2
Started this one a long time ago but never finished it. Mildly interesting plot -- a young blonde girl is found dead in the library of Colonel Bantry and his wife, Dolly. They've never seen her before in their lives, so who is she and how did she get there? It's all rather complicated, but Miss Marple figures it out. A solid mystery, but nothing as exciting as the previous one.
Murder with Mirrors * *
Bleah. This one was rather tedious. It involves an old school friend of Miss Marple's named Carrie Louise. Carrie's sister, Ruth, thinks there's something wrong in the household and asks Miss Marple to stay over and investigate. It takes a long time for the first person to die, then two more die shortly thereafter. The whole thing is rather leisurely until the first death, then things proceed rather more quickly. Uneven pacing all in all, and the characters weren't very interesting. The whole thing seemed like a mouthpiece for various perspectives on the rehabilitation of young offenders. Rather thin. Of course, the Marple adaptation will find a way to make this story even worse. :-/
Average for the set: * * * 1/2
Final assessment: Buy a copy of A Murder is Announced. Borrow a copy of The Body in the Library. Forget about Murder with Mirrors.
Easily the best of the three. A clever opening gambit: a notice is posted in the local newspaper saying that Letitia Blacklock will die at a given date and time. The whole village, being morbidly curious, shows up at her house to see the action. There's an attempted robbery -- and the robber ends up dead. But the question remains: who would want to kill Letitia, and how will they try again? First-class story, plenty of room to keep guessing, some amusing characters, and the solution was not easy to predict, at least for me.
The Body in the Library * * * 1/2
Started this one a long time ago but never finished it. Mildly interesting plot -- a young blonde girl is found dead in the library of Colonel Bantry and his wife, Dolly. They've never seen her before in their lives, so who is she and how did she get there? It's all rather complicated, but Miss Marple figures it out. A solid mystery, but nothing as exciting as the previous one.
Murder with Mirrors * *
Bleah. This one was rather tedious. It involves an old school friend of Miss Marple's named Carrie Louise. Carrie's sister, Ruth, thinks there's something wrong in the household and asks Miss Marple to stay over and investigate. It takes a long time for the first person to die, then two more die shortly thereafter. The whole thing is rather leisurely until the first death, then things proceed rather more quickly. Uneven pacing all in all, and the characters weren't very interesting. The whole thing seemed like a mouthpiece for various perspectives on the rehabilitation of young offenders. Rather thin. Of course, the Marple adaptation will find a way to make this story even worse. :-/
Average for the set: * * * 1/2
Final assessment: Buy a copy of A Murder is Announced. Borrow a copy of The Body in the Library. Forget about Murder with Mirrors.
September 4, 2012
Sure, the idioms are extremely outdated and occasionally unsettling compared to today's definitions of some of these words. However, Agatha Christie still reads fantastically and you can't go wrong sitting down to a Miss Marple tale. They definitely take more effort than some modern fare but are well worth it.
April 2, 2016
Miss Marple 05 A Murder is Announced *****
Miss Marple 03 the Body in the Library *****
Miss Marple 06 Murder with Mirrors (aka They Do it with Mirrors) *****
My Rating System:
* couldn't finish, ** wouldn't recommend, *** would recommend, **** would read again, ***** have read again.
Miss Marple 03 the Body in the Library *****
Miss Marple 06 Murder with Mirrors (aka They Do it with Mirrors) *****
My Rating System:
* couldn't finish, ** wouldn't recommend, *** would recommend, **** would read again, ***** have read again.
March 27, 2011
Aaah. Agatha.
September 8, 2008
I'm actually only reading Murder with Mirrors - but I can't find just that book to list.
Nothing like a good Agatha Christie.
Nothing like a good Agatha Christie.
Read
December 14, 2009I liked A Murder is Announced -- the others didn't grab me enough for me to finish them.
December 31, 2017
Agatha Christie wrote such engrossing stories in such a delightful way. As with all of her works, the characters in these three stories are unique--from their names to their personalities. The stories are intricate and require happily-invested, close attention. These three stories are no exception. Of course, I love Jane Marple with her quiet confidence and wisdom. Agatha shows Jane's humble attitude as Jane sweetly agrees with everyone's observance that she is a 'little, old, frail lady, dressed in simple, comfortable, if out-dated dress'. I'm always happy to meet her again when I open up another "Miss Marple" book or watch another BBC "Miss Marple" TV episode.
June 6, 2023
all three of these are amazing.
August 12, 2017
"Agatha Christie was the greatest exponent of the classical detective story. Her unique literary talents have crossed every boundary of age, race, class, geography and education. While she refined the template for a fictional form, the reading of her books became an international pastime." John Curran
I started reading and collecting Agatha Christie books when I was 9 years old. I adored her books and still do. There is a great comfort, as an adult, in reading her books and acute observations of people that favours style over the penny horrors of sadism, torture, and graphic violence favoured by some authors.
I started reading and collecting Agatha Christie books when I was 9 years old. I adored her books and still do. There is a great comfort, as an adult, in reading her books and acute observations of people that favours style over the penny horrors of sadism, torture, and graphic violence favoured by some authors.
August 12, 2017
"Agatha Christie was the greatest exponent of the classical detective story. Her unique literary talents have crossed every boundary of age, race, class, geography and education. While she refined the template for a fictional form, the reading of her books became an international pastime." John Curran
I started reading and collecting Agatha Christie books when I was 9 years old. I adored her books and still do. There is a great comfort, as an adult, in reading her books and acute observations of people that favours style over the penny horrors of sadism, torture, and graphic violence favoured by some authors.
I started reading and collecting Agatha Christie books when I was 9 years old. I adored her books and still do. There is a great comfort, as an adult, in reading her books and acute observations of people that favours style over the penny horrors of sadism, torture, and graphic violence favoured by some authors.
July 9, 2015
I read Murder with Mirrors for a summer book bingo. Published in 1952, this is full of quaint phrases that would be totally politically in correct now. But, Miss Marple is amazing and her intuition & logic legend in crime solving.
Read
August 20, 2019***1st read***
middle school
***2nd read***
9th grade
middle school
***2nd read***
9th grade
February 25, 2020
My first novel of miss Marple. The culprit deceives you till the end.
March 28, 2021
4 Stars. I have reviewed all of them under their individual listings previously. But any collection with "A Murder is Announced" in it deserves 4 stars at least. After you've read it, and digested the explanation by Miss Marple, I think you will exclaim as I did, "I should have seen that." It's one of the best of Christie's many novels. Few will say the same about "Murder with Mirrors," although "The Body in the Library" is a good one. All the best in your reading endeavours in these days of COVID. (March 2021)
May 6, 2024
Excellent compendium of Miss Marple. "A Murder is Announced" was my favourite, but also the unexpected turns of the other two, keep you on reading until you get the solution that won't come until the very end.
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews