Michael J. Ritchie's Blog, page 31

Six of the Best … Agatha Christie stories

[image error]It’s Agatha Christie’s birthday, so how better to celebrate than with six of my favourite of her stories! Agatha Christie was born on 15th September 1890 and thirty years later she would publish her first novel (the first novel she wrote, Snow on the Desert, remains unpublished) and change the face of literature forever. She is only outsold by William Shakespeare and the Bible, making her – quite comfortably – the bestselling novelist of all time. The shocking thing is that so many people I s...

“An Exaggerated Murder” by Josh Cook (2015)

[image error] “A daredevil’s thrill surged up his spine as the blood approached the toes of his shoes; an inspiring and destroying thrill for criminals, detectives and other artists of existence.”

The only time I’ve ever found Sherlock Holmes palatable is when he was strolling around modern London looking like Benedict Cumberbatch. I don’t know why I found him more believable in that guise (and even then the realism had strained to breaking point by the time the series was wrapping up) but I never got on w...

“The Binding” by Bridget Collins (2019)

[image error]“When the letter came I was out in the fields, binding up my last sheaf of wheat with hands that were shaking so much I could hardly tie the knot.”

If it wasn’t obvious, I love books. They hold such power and mystery, each one containing a new world that we’re free to explore if only we open the covers. Sometimes they are magical, other times dangerous. Sometimes they’re to entertain, or to teach. They have all sorts of purposes. Perhaps their most powerful ability is that they can store our...

Six of the Best … Morals from Mr Men books

[image error]Anyone who knows me knows that I am, of course, a huge Agatha Christie nerd. There is, however, one fictional universe that I have loved for longer and much deeper than hers, and that is the one inhabited by the Mr Men. Ever since I was a small child, I have been charmed by this series. I continue to adore the series unironically and think that there aren’t many book series of children that can compare. I’ve even started sharing the joy with my friends’ young children. At first glance, you ma...

“Time Travel: A History” by James Gleick (2016)

[image error]“A man stands at the end of a drafty corridor, a.k.a. the nineteenth century, and in the flickering light of an oil lamp examines a machine made of nickel and ivory, with brass rails and quartz rods…”

Time travel feels like it’s been a mainstay in popular culture since the dawn of time, but the concept didn’t really get going until the publication of H. G. Wells’ world-changing novel The Time Machine. I’ve covered my favourite books regarding time travel already, but I thought it was high tim...

“The Penultimate Truth” by Philip K. Dick (1964)

[image error]“A fog can drift in from outside and get you; it can invade.”

It’s been a very hot week and I really should have picked up something light and easy to read instead of a dystopian novel from the 1960s with a heavy political bent, but here we are. I’ve enjoyed books by Philip K. Dick in the past, so I hoped I’d get on with this one too, as it had an engaging premise. The reality, however, wasn’t quite like that.

In the future, people are crammed into underground tanks, living beneath the surfac...

“The Big Four” by Agatha Christie (1927)

[image error] “I have met people who enjoy a channel crossing; men who can sit calmly in their deckchairs and, on arrival, wait until the boat is moored, then gather their belongings together without fuss and disembark.”

Famed for her murder mysteries, it’s not so well known that Agatha Christie also penned a few thrillers. Some of them I’ve covered before, and rarely are they among my favourites, but they’re generally still entertaining. They’re also important because Christie wrote some of them after a b...

“The Wimbledon Poisoner” by Nigel Williams (1990)

[image error] “Henry Farr did not, precisely, decide to murder his wife.”

Wimbledon, to most people around the world, is simply the place where the tennis happens. If you’re of a certain age, you may also associate it with the Wombles, the rodent rubbish collectors of the common. This fairly affluent area of south London became central to three of Nigel Williams’ books, known as The Wimbledon Trilogy. This suburban murder mystery is the first.

Forty-year-old solicitor Henry Farr is having something of a mi...

Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2019

I’ve just had the enormous pleasure to spend four days at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. I have long-adored the city, but had never visited the world-famous festival before, so this was quite literally a dream holiday. The city remained as beautiful as ever, with the added bonus that everywhere you turned, there was a remarkable talent (or a shameless exhibitionist) on display. As my friend said, “There’s not a single room in Edinburgh they’ve not crammed something into, is there?” And she’s...

Six of the Best … London bookshops

London has an enormous literary history. From the days when Chaucer was pounding the streets, all the greats seem to have found their way here. Shakespeare had his theatre on the south bank. Dickens lived there and turned the city into a character of its own. Agatha Christie called it her home for much of her life, and along with many of the other detective writers of the era, founded a club for them to meet and socialise. To this day, it is an absolute haven for book lovers. I do apologise f...