Ordeal By Innocence - Agatha Christie

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Mrs Argyle was brutally murdered one night and police began to question all the inmates of Mr Argyle house. All the circumstances point to Mr Jacko Argyle, the youngest son of Argyle’s, as the potential murderer. The police filed a case against Mr Jacko who claims that he had a alibi of a person who provided a lift to him in a car. The investigative team tried searching for the person whose resemblance matches the description that Mr. Jacko provided. Since, they could not find any one with such characteristics, the court decides that he is making up the entire alibi and imprisons him for about 10 years. Jacko dies in prison due to pneumonia. 2 Years later, Arthur Calgary visits Mr Jacko’s house and informs them that he was an alibi that Jacko was searching upon. Calgary informs them that he was suffering from concussion and couldn’t recollect his lost memories until recently. The entire family was shocked on hearing this as there were convinced that it was Jacko who committed the murder and conveniently attributed this murder to his mental instability and short temper. The police reopens the case and tries to figure of who actually murdered Mrs. Argyle?.

Agatha Christie has proved it earlier with 5 little pigs that one need not be present in the crime scene to identify the murderer. She does the same again with Ordeal By innocence. One can also draw parallels to her other works like Crooked House (it was one of Christie’s best and very well written than this one) and Pocket full of Rye as they are all murder mysteries surrounding a dysfunctional family. The pace of the novel picks up from the very first page and it did proceed very well till about half of the book. The pace did suffer remarkably after you complete 50% only to pick up in the final chapters. Agatha Christie does not take us through the process of solving the mystery and even the astute readers of the book will not be able to deduce the murderer and the motive behind the murder. One is left wondering on how Poirot or Marple would have solved this puzzle.

Despite its short comings, its defiantly worth a read.

Rating : 3 /5

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