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Agatha Christie’s Marple: Expert on Wickedness
A new investigation from Dr Mark Aldridge, exploring a lifetime of Agatha Christie’s Miss Jane Marple.
In Agatha Christie’s Expert on Wickedness, ‘Agathologist’ Dr Mark Aldridge looks at nearly a century of St Mary Mead’s most famous resident and uses his own detective skills to uncover new information about Miss Jane Marple’s appearances on page, stage, screen and beyond.
Drawing on a range of material, some of which is newly discovered and previously unpublished, this book explores everything about Miss Marple, from her origins in a series of short stories penned by Christie, to the recent bestselling HarperCollins collection Twelve New Stories.
This accessible, entertaining and illustrated guide to the world of Miss Marple pieces together the evidence in order to tell you everything you need to know about the world’s favourite female detective.
In Agatha Christie’s Expert on Wickedness, ‘Agathologist’ Dr Mark Aldridge looks at nearly a century of St Mary Mead’s most famous resident and uses his own detective skills to uncover new information about Miss Jane Marple’s appearances on page, stage, screen and beyond.
Drawing on a range of material, some of which is newly discovered and previously unpublished, this book explores everything about Miss Marple, from her origins in a series of short stories penned by Christie, to the recent bestselling HarperCollins collection Twelve New Stories.
This accessible, entertaining and illustrated guide to the world of Miss Marple pieces together the evidence in order to tell you everything you need to know about the world’s favourite female detective.
403 pages, Kindle Edition
First published September 12, 2024
47 people are currently reading
375 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 47 reviews
October 13, 2024
A comprehensive look at Agatha Christie's fantastic creation, Miss Marple. This book is really everything you need to know about Miss Marple on screen, the stage, and of course the novels.
Starting off from when she appeared in short stories, her journey to the fantastic screen adaptation starring Joan Hickson is fully covered here along with many things I didn't know about the character along the way including many adaptations and facts that I never knew about.
The author, Mark Aldridge, does a superb job here not only with the amount of research that must have gone into this book but the way he talks about Agatha Christie. He clearly admires this superb author.
Starting off from when she appeared in short stories, her journey to the fantastic screen adaptation starring Joan Hickson is fully covered here along with many things I didn't know about the character along the way including many adaptations and facts that I never knew about.
The author, Mark Aldridge, does a superb job here not only with the amount of research that must have gone into this book but the way he talks about Agatha Christie. He clearly admires this superb author.
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March 1, 2025A great read for Miss Marple/Agatha Christie fans! The book delves into all things Marple, from novels, short stories, and movie/TV adaptations. I overall preferred the in-depth discussion about the books, the movie/TV adaptation bits were meh to me as I am much more a fan of Christie’s writing, plot, and characters to Hollywood’s attempt at bringing these things to life (they can’t seem to do it right).
March 17, 2025
Please don't hate me, but I only realized by reading this how "Murder She Wrote" is the American knock-off of Miss Marple. I'm still shaking my head at the fact that CBS couldn't get the rights to make a Miss Marple TV show (because Christie had been burned so many times because of the 70s films) so they just ripped off the whole premise.
Besides that, I thought this was a really cool look at the creation and evolution of Miss Marple from an elderly Victorian lady at the beginning of the books to an elderly post-war lady in the later books. This is completely spoiler-free, so if you haven't read the novels in question, you're safe to read this.
Also, those films sound unhinged (Miss Marple wielding a sword on a boat??)
Besides that, I thought this was a really cool look at the creation and evolution of Miss Marple from an elderly Victorian lady at the beginning of the books to an elderly post-war lady in the later books. This is completely spoiler-free, so if you haven't read the novels in question, you're safe to read this.
Also, those films sound unhinged (Miss Marple wielding a sword on a boat??)
November 2, 2024
A thorough and fascinating look at Miss Marple's depictions in books, radio, stage and screen. Highly readable.
March 1, 2025
It took me a little bit to get into this, but once I did, it was a lot of fun!
I especially enjoyed the references to "Murder, She Wrote."
I can definitely see myself referring back to this, in future, for the joy of reading all things Miss Marple.
I especially enjoyed the references to "Murder, She Wrote."
I can definitely see myself referring back to this, in future, for the joy of reading all things Miss Marple.
March 31, 2025
This book is difficult to read—because the author’s explanations and analysis require one to stop and go back to the original source material and read/reread the story! I especially appreciated learning the ordering of the Marple stories.
October 18, 2024
Excellent. Kan niet anders zeggen. Na zijn boek over Poirot, is dit het overzicht van alle (korte) verhalen waar Miss Marple een rol in speelt, de adaptaties etc.
Een must voor elke Christie fan!
Volledige bespreking is hier te vinden: https://bettinaschrijft.blogspot.com/...
Een must voor elke Christie fan!
Volledige bespreking is hier te vinden: https://bettinaschrijft.blogspot.com/...
July 24, 2025
A worthy follow up to Aldridge's Poirot. Covers all aspects of Agatha's famous sleuth and it's very refreshing to see June Whitfield's radio Marple get some respect.
August 28, 2025
In the end, Aldridge gives an interesting overview of all the Miss Marple mysteries. While it got bogged down occasionally in descriptions of letters to publishers, dragged somewhat in talking about the actors who played, had played, or thought about playing Miss Marple, and bounced around from publishers to actors to family members, on the whole, I appreciated the chance to have some background on Christie’s creative process. I also enjoyed knowing Christie’s views on television (negative) and the few movie adaptations she agreed to have done of her books (also negative!) Her antipathy to both movies and television meant only a restricted list of films were made, at least at the start. No television shows were made at all during her lifetime. Her family members, who had the rights to most stories, finally agreed, but retained strict control over most facets of the process. Aldridge outlines the writing timetable and the hiccups involved in each separate story. Since I’ve read virtually all the books, I recognized all the titles. It also was a treat to hear where Christie had struggled or made changes. My ears pricked up, too, when I read of her difficulties with licensing and copyright. She had to assign ownership of several of her works to family members to avoid tax. The complex ownership questions pursued her estate into the end of the twentieth century.
One really entertaining vignette described how Christie wanted to use the proceeds from a book sale to finance a new window at her local church in Devon. The short story was to be titled ‘Greenshaw’s Folly’. The first issue was with the window’s design; Christie objected to the first crucifixion-oriented sketch; she wanted something happy, “embodying the goodness of God, not his suffering.” Then problems emerged with the length of the story. It was too short to be serialised, but not long enough for a book. In the end, Christie junked the first plot and wrote a whole new mystery under the same title. Her agents - perhaps jokingly - called her philanthropic gesture “the bloodstained window!” She ultimately used the intended plot in another book, “Dead Man’s Folly.”
Aldridge describes several posthumous projects that included Miss Marple. One is an entirely new set of stories published in 2022. Another is a project of reading all the Marple books on the radio. The wonderful tv series with Joan Hickson for many people is the definitive Miss Marple. It ran from 1984-1992. By the time she finished filming, Hickson was over 80 years old.
One really entertaining vignette described how Christie wanted to use the proceeds from a book sale to finance a new window at her local church in Devon. The short story was to be titled ‘Greenshaw’s Folly’. The first issue was with the window’s design; Christie objected to the first crucifixion-oriented sketch; she wanted something happy, “embodying the goodness of God, not his suffering.” Then problems emerged with the length of the story. It was too short to be serialised, but not long enough for a book. In the end, Christie junked the first plot and wrote a whole new mystery under the same title. Her agents - perhaps jokingly - called her philanthropic gesture “the bloodstained window!” She ultimately used the intended plot in another book, “Dead Man’s Folly.”
Aldridge describes several posthumous projects that included Miss Marple. One is an entirely new set of stories published in 2022. Another is a project of reading all the Marple books on the radio. The wonderful tv series with Joan Hickson for many people is the definitive Miss Marple. It ran from 1984-1992. By the time she finished filming, Hickson was over 80 years old.
September 23, 2024
“AGATHA CHRISTIE’S MARPLE: Expert On Wickedness” by @drmarkaldridge is out now and available from all good bookstores.
It’s a brilliant, comprehensive tome, highly readable and chockful of tidbits about one of Christie’s most enduring characters: Miss Jane Marple. Each of the twelve Miss Marple novels is extensively researched here and has its own little “dossier”, with some beautiful, captivating (and oftentimes plain weird!) cover art sprinkled throughout their pages. Many of the revelations made by Mark continue to impress me, especially regarding Nemesis and Sleeping Murder. The short stories are of course discussed as well — in such an interesting way that I found myself instantly wanting to reread them! It has often been said that Christie’s books are “easy to read”, but what Mark’s book makes very clear is that she worked really hard to make them so.
A good portion of the book is also dedicated to the many interpretations of Marple on stage and screen. For all the obvious reasons the BBC Joan Hickson version is the most heavily discussed one (no complaints from me there) and it’s given me so much joy to read how it came to be, and how it was perceived by cast and crew as a “happy production”, having recently rewatched many of the episodes in all their HD glory on Blu-Ray. However, the chapters on the Rutherford films and the strained relationship between Christie and MGM made me realise we were very lucky to *get* the BBC adaptation (and others) at all! As with David Suchet’s portrayal of Hercule Poirot, you cannot help but wonder if Christie would have found solace in Joan Hickson bringing her Miss Marple so eminently to life on the small screen.
My loyalty to Poirot as my favourite Christie character remains unchanged — but Mark’s book has made me realise that Jane Marple comes as a *very* close second… This is a wonderful read for both Christie fanatics and casual fans alike, and is of course an excellent companion to Mark’s previous Poirot book. It is a work of reference from an authority on Agatha Christie that I shall be coming back to many times over the years…
It’s a brilliant, comprehensive tome, highly readable and chockful of tidbits about one of Christie’s most enduring characters: Miss Jane Marple. Each of the twelve Miss Marple novels is extensively researched here and has its own little “dossier”, with some beautiful, captivating (and oftentimes plain weird!) cover art sprinkled throughout their pages. Many of the revelations made by Mark continue to impress me, especially regarding Nemesis and Sleeping Murder. The short stories are of course discussed as well — in such an interesting way that I found myself instantly wanting to reread them! It has often been said that Christie’s books are “easy to read”, but what Mark’s book makes very clear is that she worked really hard to make them so.
A good portion of the book is also dedicated to the many interpretations of Marple on stage and screen. For all the obvious reasons the BBC Joan Hickson version is the most heavily discussed one (no complaints from me there) and it’s given me so much joy to read how it came to be, and how it was perceived by cast and crew as a “happy production”, having recently rewatched many of the episodes in all their HD glory on Blu-Ray. However, the chapters on the Rutherford films and the strained relationship between Christie and MGM made me realise we were very lucky to *get* the BBC adaptation (and others) at all! As with David Suchet’s portrayal of Hercule Poirot, you cannot help but wonder if Christie would have found solace in Joan Hickson bringing her Miss Marple so eminently to life on the small screen.
My loyalty to Poirot as my favourite Christie character remains unchanged — but Mark’s book has made me realise that Jane Marple comes as a *very* close second… This is a wonderful read for both Christie fanatics and casual fans alike, and is of course an excellent companion to Mark’s previous Poirot book. It is a work of reference from an authority on Agatha Christie that I shall be coming back to many times over the years…
April 18, 2025
Mark Aldridge (2024) AGATHA CHRISTIE MARPLE: EXPERT ON WICKEDNESS (AUDIOBOOK)
BorrowBox - HarperCollins
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 5 out of 5 stars
BorrowBox writes, "A new investigation from Dr Mark Aldridge, exploring a lifetime of Agatha Christie’s Miss Jane Marple. In Agatha Christie’s Marple: Expert on Wickedness, ‘Agathologist’ Dr Mark Aldridge looks at nearly a century of St Mary Mead’s most famous resident and uses his own detective skills to uncover new information about Miss Jane Marple’s appearances on page, stage, screen and beyond. Drawing on a range of material, some of which is newly discovered and previously unpublished, this book explores everything about Miss Marple, from her origins in a series of short stories penned by Christie, to the recent bestselling HarperCollins collection Marple: Twelve New Stories. This accessible, entertaining and illustrated guide to the world of Miss Marple pieces together the evidence in order to tell you everything you need to know about the world’s favourite female detective."
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Excellent. Loved this. Love Agatha Christie stories.
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#MarkAldridge #AgathaChristieMarple #Book #Books #Read #Reads #Reading #Review #Reviews #BookReview #BookReviews #GoodReads #Audiobook #Audiobooks #BorrowBox
BorrowBox - HarperCollins
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 5 out of 5 stars
BorrowBox writes, "A new investigation from Dr Mark Aldridge, exploring a lifetime of Agatha Christie’s Miss Jane Marple. In Agatha Christie’s Marple: Expert on Wickedness, ‘Agathologist’ Dr Mark Aldridge looks at nearly a century of St Mary Mead’s most famous resident and uses his own detective skills to uncover new information about Miss Jane Marple’s appearances on page, stage, screen and beyond. Drawing on a range of material, some of which is newly discovered and previously unpublished, this book explores everything about Miss Marple, from her origins in a series of short stories penned by Christie, to the recent bestselling HarperCollins collection Marple: Twelve New Stories. This accessible, entertaining and illustrated guide to the world of Miss Marple pieces together the evidence in order to tell you everything you need to know about the world’s favourite female detective."
=====
Excellent. Loved this. Love Agatha Christie stories.
=====
#MarkAldridge #AgathaChristieMarple #Book #Books #Read #Reads #Reading #Review #Reviews #BookReview #BookReviews #GoodReads #Audiobook #Audiobooks #BorrowBox
March 31, 2025
Mark Aldridge's comprehensive overview of the works of Agatha Christie continues with Miss Marple: Expert on Wickedness, following up on his successful 2020 non-fiction book about Hercule Poirot. Like the previous edition, each short story, novel and collection is covered in detail (without giving spoilers), as well as the various screen or stage adaptations, featuring a plethora of cover art and photographs of the actors playing various incarnations of the role. Obviously this one has slightly less content - given that Christie's Miss Marple output was not as prodigious as that of her Belgian detective - but nonetheless this is a fascinating and beautifully-put together book. Aldridge is clearly a Christie fan, but he never lets his knowledge and affection cloud his judgement on the more honest criticism he delivers. This is a wonderful book. Fingers crossed he has in his sights the rest of Agatha Christie's oeuvre to document, covering Tommy and Tuppence Beresford, Harley Quin, Parker Pyne, and the standalone novels. We can but hope. Recommended, especially to fans of the Queen of Crime.
May 13, 2025
Like the previous book on Poirot, this one gathers together all the instances of Miss Marple, Agatha Christie's little old lady sleuth, and reviews them in chronological order. Miss Marple first appeared in short stories, and then in full-length books. She also appeared on stage and in radio plays, as well as on TV and in movies (but mainly on TV). I love Miss Marple, and I personally am a big fan of the Joan Hickson television episodes done in the 1980s. She just hit the perfect balance of looking like a gentle rabbit, but with enough gravitas to convince us she had a brilliant mind. In all fairness, I have not seen some of the newer versions done after the Joan Hickson ones, but what a hard act to follow! Such an enjoyable book, though! Packed full of information, it is not a fast read, but I toted it around with me and read it whenever I had the chance. An invaluable reference to all things Miss Marple.
June 22, 2025
An interesting look into the creation and lasting legacy of one of Agatha Christie’s most famous characters, Miss Marple. These essays are a deep dive into each book, short story, movie, and tv show Miss Marple has featured in, with background info and, when available, Christie’s reflections on them and her contemporaneous response. While this collection has a ton of information, it can get a little repetitive, with details being reexplained if they relate to more than one book or movie. The author mentioned it was written with the idea that you could jump around between essays, reading what interests you most, but I think it would have flowed better had it been written with a narrative through-line. If you’re already a Marple fan, you’ll find lots of good info, and it has made me want to look up some of the shows based on the Marple books, as well as the new collection of stories, but I wouldn’t say it’s a must-read.
August 6, 2025
I loved this book, but then I have been a fan of Miss Jane Marple for most of my life. My blessed Mother put Agatha Christie novels in my eager hands when I outgrew Nancy Drew; for which I have been forever grateful. This has to be the definitive work on Christie's other major detective, from her first appearance in a 1927 short story till her swan song, fifty years later in "Nemesis". It follows all the stage productions, radio shows, television shows and actresses, who have played Miss Marple. For me, Joan Hickson was the quintessential Miss Marple and Margaret Rutherford, in all those terrible MGM travesties, was the worst Miss Marple, a looney , grotesque caricature of how I always envisioned Miss Marple - a quiet, thoughtful, underestimated older lady, who had no trouble believing the world could be desperately evil.
Wish I could give this 10 stars!
Wish I could give this 10 stars!
October 13, 2024
Yeah, so ... it was something.
Maybe it was weird to only hear about the Marple stories and highlight these and that's why I didn't find this anything impressive. I don't know.
It was informative and it has no fault really, other than it's rather dull.
Mark Aldridge literally starts from the beginning and talks us through every single story and TV adaptation that mentions or presents Ms Marple to us.
And while I think most fans will possibly already know a good chunk of the presented facts, the most fun I had was hearing about 'Marple', the short story collection released last year.
While I have already read it and own it, if nothing else, 'Expert on Wickedness' inspired me to reread it.
Maybe it was weird to only hear about the Marple stories and highlight these and that's why I didn't find this anything impressive. I don't know.
It was informative and it has no fault really, other than it's rather dull.
Mark Aldridge literally starts from the beginning and talks us through every single story and TV adaptation that mentions or presents Ms Marple to us.
And while I think most fans will possibly already know a good chunk of the presented facts, the most fun I had was hearing about 'Marple', the short story collection released last year.
While I have already read it and own it, if nothing else, 'Expert on Wickedness' inspired me to reread it.
January 22, 2025
I can never get enough Christie. It's an obsession. I came to this book because I've heard the author on the All About Agatha podcast which then led me to listen to his podcast "The Swinging Christies", about Christie in the decade of the 60's. Like I said... it's never enough. It was so great to hear about the books with the personal slant from her and her family added to it. I had always been confused by hearing Christie praise Margaret Rutherford's version of Marple and also denigrate it. I'm happy to have that confusion cleared up by this book. It wasn't just a simple change of mind, but was impacted by the authors relationship with the film industry. This and many other interesting tidbits certainly made this a worthwhile read. I'll be reading Aldridge's contribution on Poirot soon.
June 2, 2025
A highly enjoyable, insightful and thorough investigation of the life of Miss Marple. Beginning in the late 1920s with her earliest appearance in Christie's short stories and continuing beyond the author's death in 1976. Aldridge explores each decade focusing not only on original text, but beyond. Miss Marple's gradual emergence onto the airwaves, before continuing to stage and screen is an equally fascinating journey, with each interpretation rigerously yet fairly critiqued. Aldridge brings us up to the present day with a recent collection of 12 new stories by contemporary writers (which I have also read and enjoyed). And who knew that there is a Miss Marple jigsaw?! As a diehard Christie fan, I absolutely adored this book. Would highly recommend.
December 19, 2024
An interesting book about the life of Jane & Agatha. A little bit of a biography (of both women) and a set of book reviews, movie reviews, and story plots. Everything you wanted to know about Miss Marple and how she was created, this is the book that tells 'all', including what Agatha thought about her creation, her male rival - Prioit and the issues involved in writing her short stories, novels, and bringing them to radio and screen. Although 'long' in the read - longer than her actual novels, this is a book that 'tells all' when it comes to Jane, so great for Christie fans and lovers of crime fiction.
October 31, 2024
Loved this! I'm a huge Miss Marple fan and really enjoyed this book. It has some stuff I already knew, but plenty I didn't and it was great to go through all the Marple books, adaptations, etc. I really liked the photos of many of the different editions of the books over time, and knowing what Christie thought of them, and the way she dealt with publishers and people adapting her work. I'm also enjoying his podcast, the Swinging Christies.
I'm reading the Miss Marple novels again alongside this and it's been great.
I'm reading the Miss Marple novels again alongside this and it's been great.
December 26, 2024
I'm going to be perfectly honest: you can pretty much just go back and read my review of this author's previous book--Agatha Christie's Poirot: The Greatest Detective in the World--and substitute this book's title. Everything I said about that--entertaining, meticulously researched, well-written--applies equally here. Ironically, I ended that one wishing for a similarly excellent book about Miss Marple and Tommy & Tuppence. So I guess there's just one more left to be written!
I do want to mention the very touching dedication. If you know, you know.
I do want to mention the very touching dedication. If you know, you know.
January 4, 2025
This book is most likely of interest to those who are very familiar with all the novels and short stories involving Miss Jane Marple and her investigations. Dr. Aldridge covers material from the writings as well as the radio plays/dramas, plays, movies, and television shows. The material is broken down into chapters that covers the works a decade at a time until the the last published story (Sleeping Murder). Very informative from an expert on the work of Christie, Marple (and Poirot who he covered in a previous book in a similar manner in 2020).
February 1, 2025
Similar in approach and treatment to Mattias Bostrom’s FROM HOLMES TO SHERLOCK, this book focuses on Christie’s Miss Marple character, both in an overview of the author’s development and use of the character in her stories and novels, as well as the concurrent and later use of the character in a variety of media adaptations: radio, stage, TV, film, etc. Over the holidays, I had rewatched some of the celebrated Joan Hickson TV adaptions of the Marple novels which led me to take a chance on this book and I’m glad I did.
August 14, 2025
As in his Poirot volume, Aldridge shares the best backstories on the writing and publishing of the novels, and then moves on to the work of Agatha Christie Ltd. to preserve and protect and market Christie's work. So this is terrific for me, since I am obsessed by the little details (and the pictures of Agatha Christie and her daughter Rosalind that are created through these details), and Aldridge is the best writer on Christie that I've read. You less obsessed people might just like the book as a good reference volume.
October 4, 2024
Very detailed information of every aspect of the Miss Marple world, in media, books and film. Well researched. Would like to have seen more photographs, but I know there isn't much budget for printing glossy quality images in the Christie market. For the hardback edition in the UK: I don't like pale dust-jackets so I find both of the Poirot/Marple jacket designs annoying. Mid-tones with rich designs would suit better in my opinion.
March 28, 2025
Obviously you're reading this because you love Miss Marple. I thought this was closer to literary essays exploring themes, representations, cultural impact and such, but it was very much basic info about the production of novels, radio and tv and the receptions from reviewers with some insights of Christie's thoughts and feelings about her character. It is sort of a shame that Aldrigde never dares to interpret nor bring perspectives to what makes Miss Marple such a beloved character.
July 8, 2025
"St Mary Mead residents have immersed themselves... in the world of detective fiction. Villagers have been reading... the mystery novel The Stain on the Stairs. This title is a fictional book, but more than half a century later it was cited as one of the novels written by Jessica Fletcher, of the television series Murder, She Wrote; as her character was inspired by Miss Marple, this is unlikely a coincidence."
July 28, 2025
No es lo que esperaba, creí que sería más bien un recorrido sobre el desarrollo del personaje en sí; sus aspectos psicológicos, las ideas tras su desarrollo y demás, y en parte tuve eso, pero al mínimo.
Dicho esto, lo que nos ofrece este libro es un material bastante interesante. Si se quiere un recorrido sobre cómo se ha presentado el personaje a lo largo de la historia, con qué ideas, sus diferentes adaptaciones y las complicaciones que hubo con ellas, pues esta es la obra idónea.
Dicho esto, lo que nos ofrece este libro es un material bastante interesante. Si se quiere un recorrido sobre cómo se ha presentado el personaje a lo largo de la historia, con qué ideas, sus diferentes adaptaciones y las complicaciones que hubo con ellas, pues esta es la obra idónea.
October 15, 2024
A fascinating potted history of the beloved Agatha Christie creation, the book charts the creation and appearance of the character across nearly every type of media, including books, movies, TV and comics. Definitely a must-read for all Christie fans, and not to be missed for fans of the St Mary Mead spinster sleuth.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 47 reviews