After reading The Secret Adversary on www.dailylit.com, someone from 50_books at livejournal recommended this. Yay for recommendations. The SecretAdversary was the first book with Tommy and Tuppence, the young adventurers and amateur sleuths. I really enjoyed the snappy dialogue and characters. Partners in Crime is very good as well, following Tommy and Tuppence several years after their marriage. Tuppence is craving some of that old adventure and they get set up with a detective agency to help capture a Russian spy or something. It's a great set-up, because they model themselves after famous literary detectives for a series of cases. They adopt the mannerisms and emulate Sherlock Holmes, Roger Sheringham, and Edgar Wallace for different situations. (I confess, I did not recognize many of these characters. But I found this article about the stories. ) But they also said to use their "little grey cells, mon ami". Yes, Christie even has them use Poirot. Perfect! Anyway, I loved the book. I loved how Tuppence is treated as an equal or beyond. There is no mention of her not partaking in any adventure, nor leaving her behind. She is equal to Tommy and solves her share of the mysteries. Feminism in the 1920s is awesome.If you haven't read any Christie, you should see why she is the master mystery writer. If it's been awhile, her books are great to reread. I'm feeling some Poirot in my future. Unfortunately, while perusing my library catalogue, I noticed all the Christie books are in storage. I can still get them, but why have they been removed from the shelves? I'll have to request some, like the ABC Mystery, or The Labors of Hercules. I haven't read them in 20 years or so.
