Elephants Can Remember: A Hercule Poirot Mystery

Rating:
Summary: Confusing murder in retrospect mystery
Review: Celia Ravenscroft is but a little girl when both her parents commit suicide. Never did she worry about the real reasons for that dramatic event, until today when she stands on the verge of getting married to Desmond Burton-Cox. Only one question suddenly seems of importance: Who killed whom, Celia's father or mother? Reason enough for Ariadne Oliver, Celia's godmother, to pay a visit to her old friend Hercule Poirot. The famous sleuth persuades Mrs. Oliver to delve -with his guidance, of course- into the past, to find the persons who are like elephants, the persons who will still remember the important details about this all-but-forgotten tragedy.

Elephants Can Remember is Agatha Christie's next to last work of detection and the author shows clearly signs of age, which is understandable since she was eighty-two years old and in failing health.

Elephants Can Remember is a "murder in retrospect" mystery. Although Christie has proven to fully master this format -see Sparkling Cyanide and Five Little Pigs- she now quickly looses touch with the story. She is forced to sow the narrative together with vague memories of a series of old spinsters and suddenly even events that should easily be remembered are covered by the veil of forgetfulness. No surprise that the plot is total confusion. It is less a mystery than a scrapbook of memories. Action is less important than atmosphere, which makes the story quite tedious and difficult to hang on to. Nevertheless, the experienced reader will figure out the solution to this not too mysterious mystery halfway through the book.

Rating:
Summary: Cosy and nice.
Review: Great book
I bought this book on tape by John Moffatt (no! not BY him, but read by him). This book proves a theory though; there's a significant change in Mrs. Christies writing over the years; the nice young lady who writes well-puzzled, crafted, formula, to-the-point murder mystery; and the old lady who's slightly bitter to the modern world, but writes more real and cozy books, about peoples lives. More relaxed and less upthight books. This book falls into the latter category. That doesn't mean it' a bad book, no-no! It's good, but different from earlier works. The later books seem to be more relaxed, and more about looking back, and viewing things from a distance; about great characters telling(not acting)great stories! This book really has a realistic ring to it; it has good, funny characters. It's not as "British murder mystery" as some of her other work, but more real, somehow.

PS. Those of you who didn't like the book, get a hold of John Moffatt's reading, he's great! Really makes the characters come alive!!

Rating:
Summary: Poirot Relies on "Elephants" to Solve Long-Ago Mystery
Review: Twenty years before this novel opens, a tragic double-death has occurred. Alistair Ravenscroft and his wife Margaret were found shot to death near their home. The deaths were declared suicides at the time. Now, years later, their daughter Celia is engaged to be married. Her future mother-in-law wants to know more about the cirumstances of the death and if the wife killed the husband or the husband killed the wife. She does not want some inherited proclivity to murder to affect her son. Celia turns to her godmother, Ariadne Oliver, who once again enlists the help of her old friend Hercule Poirot. Together they track down a list of "elephants," people with long memories who never forget past events. The officer who had been in charge of the case, a wig stylist, two French governesses, and a family friend each remember some piece of information that Poirot can collect and assemble as he uncovers secrets long buried and brings the truth to light.

This is Mrs. Oliver's final appearance in a Christie novel and also the last Poirot book Agatha Christie wrote, although readers will see him again in "Curtain" which she wrote during the 1940's but was not published until 1975.