Postern of Fate (Tommy & Tuppence, #5)

by Agatha Christie

[brokentune]

Postern of Fate was Dame Agatha's last book. And knowing this, made reading the book rather sad. Not only because it is the last book she wrote but also because she seemed to have written it in a way to emphasize that this truly was Tommy and Tuppence Beresford's last hurrah.

So, we have Tommy and Tuppence in their seventies, moving into a new home in the country, and being reminded by their acquaintances of the great adventures they used to get into. As they start to get settled in their new house, Tuppence finds a book that contains a coded message to indicate that Mary Jordan did not die of natural causes.

But who was Mary Jordan?

The unravelling of the mystery ensues.

While the first half of the book was not horrible and seemed to merely meander through the nostalgia of the earlier adventures of T&T, the rest of the book seemed to pursue a similar line of conspiracy theory as the abominable Passenger to Frankfurt (yes, some of the characters in Passenger also appear in Postern of Fate) and the slightly less annoying Destination Unknown.

Not that I don't enjoy a good conspiracy story, but not if it is told in such a rambling manner, without a logical train of thought, and, of course, not when it is anywhere near as ridiculous as or even reminding me of Passenger to Frankfurt.

So, with all these points against it, do I regret reading it? No. But then, I am a Christie fan/completist and appreciate that she is thought to have struggled with dementia in the late years of her life. A theory which the quality of her writing and plotting in her later books seems to support.