Five Little Pigs by Agatha Christie * * * *

Agatha Christie's Five Little Pigs was written in the 1940s, so it's a rather old book—but that's true of pretty much all of Agatha Christie's books. I actually tried to read this book once before. Funny thing: when I was in high school, I had a summer of reading Agatha Christie. I didn't just read Poirot and Miss Marple, but I also read Tommy and Tuppence’s stories. I highly recommend them; I really love that duo. The best one was N or M?, which is actually more of a spy novel than anything else.

That summer, I got most of my books from an antique store because they were very cheap there. The library didn’t really have Agatha Christie because it was considered lowbrow reading—not classic literature. The books I bought were old. My copy of Five Little Pigs was a misprint, missing parts of the story, so I never finished it. Plus, by the end of the summer, I had to switch back to reading the required school books, which were long and numerous. I got behind because of my Agatha Christie binge and had to catch up during the school year, which wasn’t fun.

This time, I listened to Five Little Pigs as an audiobook because I’m trying out different audiobook services right now, and the one I’m using had it. It was read by Hugh Fraser, who used to play Captain Hastings in the Poirot TV series. I actually watched most of those in Hungarian, too, so it was kind of weird. But I love that series; it’s one of my favourite things to watch on TV. Actually, I’m going to re-watch the TV series version of this book now that I’ve read it.

I think the audiobook format is much better for this book. The whole story is basically in three parts: Book One, Book Two, and Book Three. Book One is Poirot getting the assignment. If you read the synopsis, it’s basically this: 16 years ago, there was a murder, and a woman was convicted for it. The woman’s daughter comes to Poirot, seeking to find out the truth. Her mother wrote her a letter saying she was innocent, and the daughter wants to know whether her mother was really a murderer. She’s getting married, and back then, there was this idea that if your parents were immoral, you’d inherit immorality.

In Book One, Poirot interviews everyone involved in the case. I would have liked it better if this audiobook had been done like a radio play, with different people voicing the characters. The whole book is mostly dialogue, with very little description or action. It would have been amazing if each character had their own voice.

In Book Two, everyone writes letters to Poirot, describing their recollections of the day of the murder and the events leading up to it. Each chapter is one person’s letter.

Book Three is the conclusion, where Poirot gathers everyone in one room and reveals the truth, as he always does. You find out who the murderer was.

Honestly, I would’ve been bored if I had just read this book. I like action and movement in stories. As an audiobook, it worked. It was almost like a podcast, which really suited it.

Agatha Christie also wrote plays, and this book shows how well her stories work in a visual or auditory medium.

I won’t go into the characters because that would spoil the story. But they were all distinct. My one issue was that one of the men was named Meredith. I know it’s an old male name, but nowadays, it’s mostly a female name. I had to keep reminding myself that Meredith was a man. It was funny because I’d picture a woman, and then the text would mention his moustache, and I’d think, "Oh right, he’s a guy."

Overall, it’s a good story, though not one of Christie’s best. I recommend watching the TV adaptation with David Suchet. He is Poirot. Suchet went through all the novels with a fine-tooth comb, noting everything Christie ever said about Poirot. You can’t get better than that. As a side note, watch David’s Who Do You Think You Are episode, it has some amazing stories of his family.

Interestingly, Five Little Pigs reminded me of old epistolary novels, where the story unfolds through letters.

This was the pick for the Agatha Christie Official Book Club for January. They’re choosing books based on occupations this year, and this one was for “artists.” There were alternative options, but I really wanted to get through this one since I missed it during my high school Agatha Christie binge—nearly 30 years ago!

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