J o h n e s c o t t agatha Christie

Dartmoor, a beautiful, lonely moor in Devon
seemed to come alive inside her head, and during her 
walks she planned her writing for the next day.
She finished the last half of the book during her holiday, 
and soon after she sent it to a publisher. They returned it, 
but Agatha was not surprised. She sent it out again, but it 
came back once more. She sent it to a third publisher, but
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Agatha Christie, Woman o f Mystery
they returned it, too. Then she sent it to The Bodley Head 
publishing company - and forgot all about it.
Two years went by. Archie came back to work in 
London, the war ended, and Agatha had a baby -
Rosalind. The three of them were living in a flat in 
London when a letter arrived one morning in 1919.
It was from The Bodley Head. Agatha quickly opened 
the letter, and saw the words:
. . . will you call at our offices? . . . we would like to talk 
about your book . . .
‘It’s about my book - The Mysterious Affair at Styles,’ 
she told Archie. T think they want to publish it!’
‘Then you must go and see them at once!’ said Archie. 
Agatha went to the publishers’ office. She met John 
Lane, a small man with white hair.
‘Do sit down,’ he said. He had a kind voice, and 
blue eyes that looked carefully at Agatha. ‘Some of my 
readers think that we could publish your book. But you 
will need to change the last chapter. And there are a few 
other small things . . .’
Agatha was too excited to listen. She was happy to 
do anything. The Mysterious Affair at Styles was her 
first detective story, and she wanted to see it in the 
bookshops. So she wrote a different ending for it and 
changed one or two more small things, and at last John 
Lane was pleased with it.
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CHAPTER 5
A good detective-story writer
A
gatha’s first book, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, 
was published in 1920. But before this, she began 
writing another book.
It was Archie’s idea.
‘Mother is finding it difficult to pay all the bills at 
Ashfield,’ Agatha told him.
‘Why doesn’t she sell Ashfield?’ Archie said to Agatha. 
‘The house is too big for just one person. Then she can 
buy something smaller.’
‘Sell Ashfield?’ said Agatha. ‘Oh, no! She can’t! I love 
it - and it’s our family home.’
‘Then why don’t you do something about it?’ said 
Archie.
‘Do something? What do you mean?’
‘Why don’t you write another book?’ said Archie. 
‘Perhaps it will make a lot of money.’
Agatha thought about it. Ashfield was her family 
home, and it must stay in the family. Could she do 
anything to help?
‘Perhaps I could write another book,’ she thought. 
‘But what can it be about?’
The answer came one day when she was having tea in
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Agatha Christie, Woman o f Mystery
a tea-shop. Two people were talking at a table near her. 
Agatha heard a name - and began to listen. They were 
talking about somebody called Jane Fish.
‘What a strange name,’ thought Agatha. ‘But what a 
good beginning for a story! Somebody hears a strange 
name in a tea-shop. And then . . .? Wait, perhaps “Jane 
Finn” will be better. Yes! Now, let me think . . .’
And before Agatha left the tea-shop, an idea for a 
story was running around inside her head. She went 
home and began it immediately.
She called it The Secret Adversary, and the book was 
published in 1922.
The story did not have the Belgian detective Hercule 
Poirot in it, but her next book, Murder on the Links, 
did. Readers loved Poirot. He was a very short, tidy 
little man, with green eyes, black hair, and a beautiful 
black moustache. And, like another famous detective, 
Sherlock Holmes, he was very, very clever. He was not 
shy about this, and was always telling other characters 
in the story just how clever he was.
Other books followed, some with Poirot, some 
without - The M an in the Brown Suit, Poirot Investigates, 
and The Secret o f Chimneys.
Hughes Massie, the agent, was helping Agatha now. 
‘You need another publisher,’ he told her. ‘A publisher 
who will pay you more than The Bodley Head. You’re a
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A good detective-story writer