What character annoys you most in the Agatha Christie books?

[Watermelonice]

Mine has to be Ariadne Oliver, I switch off completely when she appears and I keep reading the same lines over and over again!

Christie had a low opinion of women’s recall.

Or she subconsciously liked the idea of wiping one's first husband from one's memory.

Magda, the actress mother in Crooked House. All of Sophia's immediate family are pretty dreadful really, but Magda is the worst.

Favourite book? Mine is A Murder is Announced or the Body in the Library. I like Miss Marple.

I also like the Halowe’en one - it’s very atmospheric. I love all the old book covers.

I like Ariadne Oliver as a character but she's sometimes badly written - I think the worst is in Elephants Can Remember, which was written in the early 1970s, and the writing really shows Agatha Christie struggling with what was perhaps early dementia - lots of plot holes and all the characters end up with virtually the same speech pattern. It does show up in some others a little but that's the worst one I've re-read recently.

I think all of her books are interesting to look at as as a set, as you can see her putting in far more commentary on how things have changed in later ones.

I read the books years ago when I was quite young, but more recently have just watched the various tv productions.

I am enjoying the books again now, slowly working through them and they are quite different to some of the newer productions, and a lot more detailed.

I am on Pale Horse at the moment and just finished Towards Zero.

Heather Badcock.

@misslydgatesproofs completely agree with you on Elephants Can Remember. It's almost unreadable in parts.
But I find Ariadne quite amusing in general.

I like Peril At End House best, and I love the adaptation with Polly Walker as Nick Buckley.

I love Cat Among the Pigeons, Sleeping Murder and Evil under the Sun. Postern of Fate too. I think my least favourite is Endless Night, which was a perfectly good short story but a really drawn out full length book.