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    Cards on the Table: A Hercule Poirot Mystery: The Official Authorized Edition
    Cards on the Table: A Hercule Poirot Mystery: The Official Authorized Edition
    Cards on the Table: A Hercule Poirot Mystery: The Official Authorized Edition
    Audiobook6 hours

    Cards on the Table: A Hercule Poirot Mystery: The Official Authorized Edition

    Written by Agatha Christie

    Narrated by Hugh Fraser

    4.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    In Agatha Christie’s classic mystery, Cards on the Table, the wily Hercule Poirot is on the case when a bridge night turns deadly

    Mr. Shaitana is famous as a flamboyant party host. Nevertheless, he is a man of whom everybody is a little afraid. So when he boasts to Hercule Poirot that he considers murder an art form, the detective has some reservations about accepting a party invitation to view Shaitana’s “private collection.”

    Indeed, what begins as an absorbing evening of bridge is to turn into a more dangerous game altogether.…

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperAudio
    Release dateJul 3, 2012
    ISBN9780062229557
    Author

    Agatha Christie

    Agatha Christie is known throughout the world as the Queen of Crime. Her books have sold over a billion copies in English with another billion in over 70 foreign languages. She is the most widely published author of all time and in any language, outsold only by the Bible and Shakespeare. She is the author of 80 crime novels and short story collections, 20 plays, and six novels written under the name of Mary Westmacott.

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    Reviews for Cards on the Table

    4.5/5

    291 ratings50 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Despite the fact I’ve never played bridge a key component of the murder setting, this was a lot of fun. I always enjoy the impossible scenario of who did it?! And there are many amusing references that are tongue in check. Such as a character whose a woman mystery author, famous for writing about a foreign detective in England.
    • 4/5
      This was an excellent one featuring Monsieur Poirot and Ariadne Oliver. The murder takes place at the home of Mr Shaitana. While a bridge game is going on, someone murders Mr. Shaitana, but why? I liked that there were 4 murder experts and 4 suspects. Very entertaining read.
    • 3/5
      So I finished this book today, and I really enjoyed it!

      Agatha Christie is a classic mystery author and this is another really good book. I'm more of a Miss Marple fan (knitting, crime-solving, sassy badass that she is) but Poriot is not a bad detective either.

      Without spoiling it, all of these characters had really interesting back stories and there were plenty of twists and turns and suspects. The interesting part of this story is that no one seems to have a motive, at first, but it all unfolds after that.

      It's a decent, cozy mystery. I always find Agatha Christie to be a really good palette cleanser after a difficult or heavy novel. And as a writer, I'm always impressed with how prolific she was. c:

      A solid 3 starts. c:
    • 3/5
      I kind of liked except of the ending... I felt dumb.
    • 3/5
      I had read this book about 15 years ago But 1) It was in French and 2) I read the ending so fast that it didn't register with me who the murderer was. Now that I've finally read it, I'm glad that, months later, I'm penning a review for this quite original story. If I understand rightly, there are the four suspects and all four are murderers. The young girl who was a kleptomaniac was one, then there's the murderer himself. A quite original and riveting tale. Poirot is surprisingly present this once. I also always appreciate the fictional author, Ariadne Oliver, to make an appearance.
    • 5/5
      Love Love Loved it
    • 3/5
      I thought I had this figured out early, but I was wrong! I listened to this (a "radio play" version, really), and I find the BBC productions of Christie's books to be quite charming. If you need something to pass a couple of hours, I recommend them. This is the first Poirot I've listened to, and I think I prefer Miss Marple -- Poirot's accent takes some getting used to.
    • 4/5
      Having never read an Agatha Christie mystery before, I was not sure what to expect going into Cards on the Table. I quickly discovered Christie's reputation is well-deserved. Cards on the Table has a gripping premise from the beginning. The enigmatic Mr. Shaitan invites the incomparable Hercule Poirot to an evening gathering. Upon arrival, it doesn't take long for Poirot to deduce the nature of the gathering. Four of the guests are sleuths of some variety or another, including an army Colonel, a Superintendent of Scotland Yard, Poirot himself, and a famed mystery writer. And the other four guests? It is soon revealed they are murderers who have gotten away with their crimes. For his disturbing sense of humor, Shaitan is rewarded with a knife in the chest at the beginning of the novel. Four sleuths matched up against four suspects, the latter all known to be capable of murder. And the mystery is underway! Despite the unlikely circumstance of the murder, Christie pulls it off brilliantlyInevitably, my thoughts as I read this book drifted to a comparison between Hercule Poirot and Sherlock Holmes. As a huge fan of Holmes, I was surprised by how well Poirot stacked up. Poirot is almost Holmes's opposite. Whereas Holmes relies on evidence, Poirot has a more psychological mind. Whereas Holmes operates outside of the law, Poirot works with and respects the police. Indeed, in Christie's world the police are competent and skilled. Superintendent Battle, a character from other Christie novels, does as much sleuthing as Poirot. I was able to appreciate Poirot for the unique character he is. It helped that Christie gave a few appreciative nods to Doyle's character at a couple of points.The mystery itself is relatively mundane. Christie is relying on her ability at characterization to hold the interest of the reader. It is a successful gamble. Each character is interesting in his or her own way. What helped the book greatly was Christie's especially brilliant tongue-in-cheek character Mrs. Oliver. A mystery writer of great fame, Mrs. Oliver inserts herself into the police investigation and proceeds to pronounce every suspect as most certainly the killer at one point or another. Christie uses Oliver to make fun of herself throughout the book. Yet Christie doesn't overdo it, Mrs. Oliver is no buffoon (at least not completely). She contributes in her own way to the solving of the case.This isn't a perfect novel. Without a working knowledge of the card game bridge, it isn't easy to follow some of Poirot's psychological analysis. The very end of the novel also takes a few turns too many in my opinion. Some of the content I would consider bordering on racist. But overall, this is a fun mystery novel and from what I understand, it isn't even considered one of Christie's best.
    • 1/5
      for some reason it just cut off the last 10 minutes of the last chapter. so maybe listen at your own risk.
    • 4/5
      This was a very interesting plot, murder in plain sight of others..... The clue was there right in the "interviews" of the suspects.

      Mr Shaitana (who fashions himself after a modern Mephistopheles in dress & manner) makes it his business to collect things, including people's dirty secrets.... Unfortunately he turned out to be a very "stupid" man (M. Poirot's words), for Mr Shaitana decided to give a party and invite 4 people (all who have apparently gotten away with murder) and 4 great detectives (M. Poirot, Superintendent Battle, Mrs. Ariadne Oliver, & Colonel Race) to have dinner with him.

      The two groups of people were in separate rooms playing bridge.... Mr. Shaitana was in w/ the 4 murderers sitting in front of the fire and was found slumped in his chair, apparently sleeping..... But in reality murdered w/ a pretty little dagger.

      The four detectives go about working on different aspects, all gathering clues & interviewing the suspects in their own particular manner.... And then there is another murder and an attempted murder.

      This was the first time that I understood M. Poirot's methods, although as they followed the bridge scores, I didn't understand them. Mrs. Oliver was outright annoying. Sadly, Superintendent Battle wasn't as visible as in the past & Colonel Race was off quietly making inquiries so one didn't get to follow his investigation at all.

      It was a pretty satisfying mystery......

    • 3/5
      This novel has one guessing at the killer until the very end. Christie is a master at the surprise ending. Poirot didn't come into it as much as I would have liked, but he used a characteristically unlikely approach to solving the crime - that of analyzing the characters of the different suspects in order to discover which of them would be more likely to commit that kind of crime. This wasn't my favorite novel by A. Christie, but I did enjoy the novel approach to solving a crime.
    • 5/5
      Considered by many to be her greatest work, it certainly is one of her finest. Agatha Christie herself said there are only four starters and any one of them might have committed the crime. One detective per suspect is a great idea, although as one of them is Poirot, there's really only one. Agatha Christie thought the limited number of suspects might knock out the surprise. But it doesn't. In many ways it easier to keep up with who's who.Poirot's thought process is as baffling as ever, and full of clues if only we could spot them. The really big clue comes though in the…Christie at her best!Nina Jon is the author of the Jane Hetherington’s Adventures in Detection crime and mystery series.
    • 3/5
      3* If you are an Agatha Christie fan, this is yet another of her murder mysteries which Monsieur Hercule Poirot - to the amazement of all around - solves.
    • 5/5
      I love having Hugh Fraser read Poirot. He does a great imitation of David Suchet's Poirot, from the TV series. The book stands up very well, full of insight into character, a specialty of Christie's, of course.
    • 4/5
      This was an excellent one featuring Monsieur Poirot and Ariadne Oliver. The murder takes place at the home of Mr Shaitana. While a bridge game is going on, someone murders Mr. Shaitana, but why? I liked that there were 4 murder experts and 4 suspects. Very entertaining read.
    • 4/5
      Excellent Christie. A nice departure from her more formulaic books.
    • 5/5
      Cards on the Table was an exemplary Poirot mystery. I really liked the introduction where she explains how there is none of the 'pick the least likely character' aspect to figure out the killer. Four bridge players, four suspects, one killer. Outstanding
    • 4/5
      I have been reading a number of bridge-related mysteries lately, and so far this is the best of the lot. M. Poirot is invited to an evening of dinner and bridge, at which the host is murdered. He works with the police but also with the other guests to identify the killer. I'm not a huge fan of Poirot--it's hard to think along with him, because he reveals so little--but he does a nice job of using the players' bridge techniques to characterize the players, and actually makes use of what was going on during the game to solve the puzzle.
    • 4/5
      In one room: Poirot and his friends play bridge. In the other: Mr. Shaitana and his exhibits play murder.

      "Cards on the Table" sees Christie at the height of her powers, and also at her most self-referential. A hedonistic collector invites four detectives – Poirot,and three of her recurring sleuths, Colonel Race, Superintendent Battle, Mrs. Oliver – to play bridge with four criminals. When their host is, inevitably, murdered, it becomes clear that the four are suspects and, as Christie notes in her introduction, this is no trick: there are four suspects only. Logic and reason will see us to the conclusion. (Well, that and a damn good knowledge of bridge.)

      This was the introduction into Poirot's world of Ariadne Oliver, Christie’s surrogate character in the canon, and one of her most delightful portrayals. Already bitter about her recurring Finnish detective and his silly quirks, Oliver gets to waffle on at length about detective fiction without ever feeling like she’s hammering home a point. All four detectives are permitted some investigation, which allows Poirot to function as a vital part of the novel, rather than a God. (This is not inherently a flaw but it’s nice to see him rubbing up against other people’s deductive techniques.) The victim is fascinating, the suspects equally so, and – with their backgrounds as alleged killers – the contrivances never feel like anything less than a natural part of the plot. (*coughCat Among the Pigeonscough*)

      The David Suchet adaptation – which introduced Zoe Wanamaker as Oliver – took countless liberties with the plot, none of which were necessary but none were disastrous, but was delightful and atmospheric: how can you go wrong with a story such as this? There are no flaws in the story or in the construction, but interestingly this is Christie at her most Conan Doyle-esque. For those of us who aren’t familiar with bridge, the lengthy examinations of the score card are slightly bewildering, but this kind of long-form thinking – not just figuring out that the initials on a handkerchief are in a different language, for instance – comes across as real deductive thinking, the kind of powers that Poirot has always professed separate him from the lower forms of investigators.

      Poirot ranking: 4th out of 38
    • 4/5
      another good book from Agatha Christi. Once again the reader is left feeling that he should have known: all the clues were there, all the hints from the writer...
      interesting characters: a police inspector who is not a fool.
      also a lady novelist of whodunnit books.
    • 3/5
      more believable than most of Christie's plots
    • 4/5
      I enjoyed the Poirot I read recently and picked up another from the selection in the local library. This is classic Christie. She creates a field of suspects for a murder that is only four people wide, and then proceeds to show how they all have a motive, they all have opportunity etc. It's all quite neat. In a way it's very formulaic but that's not a problem. It's very entertaining having each suspect built up as the murderer and then played down again; and then there are four separate mysteries investigated as each suspect's background is looked into. The ending piles layers of misdirection on top of each other - honestly, I already can't remember who actually did it. It doesn't really matter, it's just fun to read.
    • 3/5
      A group of peple, all a;llegedly murdees who have escaped detecton, are invited to an uneasy dinner; another murder follows. The plot reminds me of Catr's Death in FIve Boxes.
    • 5/5
      One of her best, by a most underrated author, who has influenced this genre in books and films more than anyone.
    • 5/5
      Only four suspects, who could it be?

      This is one of Dame Agatha's books where she adeptly uses the narrative trick, as she's never used it before. You'd think that from four suspects you could easily pick out who did it. I guessed, and rationalized, because I really want to point out the murderer for once for Pete's sake, but that old woman, she kept on throwing ploys at me.

      And I enjoyed being bamboozled. Cheers for this novel!
    • 4/5
      An enjoyable Hercule Poirot mystery with an unusual setup: four potential sleuths, four potential murderers, all in the room together when their host dies. All four sleuths are characters Christie has used before or will use again, and three - Hercule Poirot, Superintendent Battle, and Ariadne Oliver - star in books of their own. If Christie didn't write it yourself, you might almost think it was an homage.Almost all of the detection here simply involves the different protagonists going around and, in their own ways, getting information from the suspects - a fairly passive investigation, but Christie keeps it crisp and interesting. Everyone has an individual character, with special note for Mrs. Oliver, a very funny self-mockery of Christie herself. She and Poirot don't share an awful lot of dialogue together, but that's for later (far later) novels. The one big criticism is that it ends quite suddenly - the denoument having occurred in a very exciting way, mind, with a couple of big bluffs. And then the book just stops, on a rather tedious, jokey note. It needed at least one more chapter just to wrap it all up.Still - a pleasantly entertaining book, somewhat untrumpeted amongst Christie's successes of the 1930s.
    • 4/5
      This was a pretty good mystery from Agatha Christie. Both Battle and Poirot were major charactors in it. I was hard trying to figure out who did it because there was 3 murderers in the book and 4 murders. Who did what and why was an interest task to keep straight. Poirot of course saves the day once more with the method and his little grey cells.
    • 5/5
      Another entertaining Poirot – I found it absolutely fascinating to read, especially by the way that Poirot deducts the murderer by asking questions about what they remembered of the room that evening and how their bridge game went. I have seen the TV film of this one but it didn’t ruin it for me at all. Agatha Christie has a great way with words, and makes the story seem so alive and kept me engaged the whole way through. I got halfway and couldn’t put it down!Mrs Oliver, the author, was great fun to read, too, which didn’t let the book get too ‘heavy.’ But just as you think you know who the murderer is, there’s a great twist at the end! I also liked how my copy had copies of their bridge cards, that Poirot talks about throughout the story; I don’t understand card games at all but I thought it was a nice touch. It made the story seem a lot more ‘real.’
    • 4/5
      Absolutely classic Poirot. Mr Shaitana, a very wealthy but rather dubious character, invites eight people to dinner. Four people have a secret in their past, the other four are crime solvers. Poirot is one of the guests, along with Police Superintendent Battle, secret agent Colonel Race and Mrs Oliver, a writer of murder mysteries. At some point during the evening, in which the all guests play bridge but their host doesn't, Mr Shaitana is stabbed to death. But which of the four guests who were with him in the room at the time did it?Poirot and the other three crime solvers decide to combine forces to get to the bottom of Shaitana's death. I don't know how autobiographical the character of Mrs Oliver was, but I loved the idea of a crime writer who has decided to make her detective a Finn, without actually knowing anything about Finland. She bemoans the fact that the Finns seem to be avid readers of crime novels and thus all her slips relating to his characteristaion get pointed out and she wishes she had made him a Hungarian. This is one of those murders where the victim is someone whom everyone dislikes and the descriptions of Mr Shaitana with regard to his nationality (which actually is rather vague) are of their time, but one can't hold the novels of the 1930s by today's standards.I actually did work out who the murderer was, though for quite a lot of the book, I thought I was wrong after all. As should be the case with murder mysteries, it all wraps up tidily and the nice people prosper while the villains meet an appropriate end.
    • 4/5
      Superb. Mr Shaitana hints to Poirot that he collects murderers who got away with it and invites Poirot and three other 'experts', Battle, Race and Mrs Olover to dinner with four people who may already have murdered someone. When Shaitana is killed Poirot and the others experts must discover which of the other four is definitely a killer. Just when you think you know who the murderer is you discover you actually don't. All this plus Christie's sort of alter ego, Mrs Oliver, wonderful!