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Agatha Christie

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Death Comes As the End (Agatha Christie Mysteries Collection) Kindle Edition

by Agatha Christie (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

4.4 1,749 ratings

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In Death Comes As the End, Dame Agatha Christie transports us back to ancient Egypt 2000 B.C. where a priest’s daughter, investigating a suspicious death, uncovers an asp’s nest of jealousy, betrayal, and serial murder.

It is Egypt in 2000 BC, where death gives meaning to life. At the foot of a cliff lies the broken, twisted body of Nofret, concubine to a ka-priest. Young, beautiful, and venomous, most agree that it was fate—she deserved to die like a snake!

But at her father's house on the banks of the Nile, the priest's daughter Renisenb believes that the woman's death is suspicious. Increasingly, she becomes convinced that the source of evil lurks within their household—and watches helplessly as the family's passions explode in murder. . . .

Editorial Reviews

Review

“Agatha Christie was the absolute master of misdirection. No matter how logical we think we’re being when we read her, she always manages to send us swimming after her red herrings while ignoring that huge whale in the corner of the tank.” — Margaret Maron, award-winning author of the Deborah Knott Mysteries

“Startlingly new....My admiration for her leaps even higher.” — Observer (London)

From the Back Cover

It is Egypt in 2000 BC, where death gives meaning to life. At the foot of a cliff lies the broken, twisted body of Nofret, concubine to a ka-priest. Young, beautiful, and venomous, most agree that it was fate—she deserved to die like a snake!

But at her father's house on the banks of the Nile, the priest's daughter Renisenb believes that the woman's death is suspicious. Increasingly, she becomes convinced that the source of evil lurks within their household—and watches helplessly as the family's passions explode in murder. . . .

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B003A7I2MS
Publisher ‏ : ‎ William Morrow Paperbacks; Reprint edition (February 27, 2010)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ February 27, 2010
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 2270 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
Print length ‏ : ‎ 273 pages

Best Sellers Rank: #225,734 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #966 in 20th Century Historical Romance (Books)
- #1,064 in Read & Listen for Less
- #1,131 in Historical Mystery, Thriller & Suspense Fiction

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4.4 1,749 ratings

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Agatha Christie

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Born in Torquay in 1890, Agatha Christie began writing during the First World War and wrote over 100 novels, plays and short story collections. She was still writing to great acclaim until her death, and her books have now sold over a billion copies in English and another billion in over 100 foreign languages. Yet Agatha Christie was always a very private person, and though Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple became household names, the Queen of Crime was a complete enigma to all but her closest friends.

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Laura's Reviews

Enjoyable Historical Mystery!

Reviewed in the United States on September 9, 2023

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Do you like it when a favorite author tries something new? While I do find comfort in authors staying the same, I really like it when they explore new areas. Death Come as the End was intriguing at Agatha Christie decided to set her mystery not during her contemporary times, but 2000 years in the past.

In Egypt, 2000, Imhotep, the ka-priest, has brought home a new young concubine, Nofret. His adult sons and wives are already restless and wanting to have more responsibility. Nofret sows more seeds of doubt and malice, until one day she is found dead at the foot of a cliff. Imhotep’s daughter, Renisenb thinks Nofret’s death is suspicious and starts to investigate the crime. Who murdered Nofret and who will be the next victim?

Death Comes as the End was the August pick for #ReadChristie2023 and I enjoyed listening to the audiobook last month. The prompt for August was “Fall from a Height.” Emilia Fox was a great narrator. I have listened to several books narrated by her and found that she is on my list of favorite narrators. I enjoy how she acts out the part and has a different voice for each character.

As usual, I thought I had this one figured out, but Agatha Christie surprised me again at the end. I did like the bit of a love story that was involved in this book as well. I enjoyed the Author’s note at the beginning of the novel that explains the time and place of the story as well as her inspiration from ancient texts. I enjoyed this brief foray into ancient Egypt.

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Hal Jordan

Unusual Christie mystery set in ancient Egypt

Reviewed in the United States on August 17, 2019

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This novel, first published in 1944, was, so far as I know, the only book that Christie wrote that wasn't set in the present. She wrote a number of non-series mysteries, some of which are quite good, but set them all in the present--raising the question of why Poirot wasn't called in to help!

The book is from Christie's best period, stretching from the 1920s to roughly the end of WW II. Of that group of very good books, I would place this near the bottom. Although the mystery has some interesting elements and the story moves at a rapid pace, the book has several drawbacks. First, Christie was never a great one for describing her settings in much detail. Usually that's not a problem because most of her books are set in fairly familiar surroundings. But this book is set in ancient Egypt and it would have been interesting to have spent more time describing what the houses were like, how the people dressed, and what they ate.

Granted, more description would have slowed the story down but if you're going to set a book in a locale as exotic as ancient Egypt don't you need to describe it? Otherwise, why bother? She does make some effort to distinguish the main characters' thoughts and attitudes from those of modern people, but I don't think she's entirely successful. Too often her characters seemed to act as mid-twentieth century English people would if somehow they were plopped down in ancient Egypt.

[POSSIBLE SPOILER ALERT] Finally, I don't think I'm giving anything away here, but I thought a "spoiler alert" was worth adding just in case. In the end, the murderer's motive is that he's mentally ill. That is about the worst possible way to resolve a mystery and not typically the kind of thing Christie would rely on.

So, I think this novel is interesting enough to merit four stars (although I was a bit torn between giving it three stars or four stars) but it's far from Christie's best work.

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Matthew Kresal

Death on the Ancient Nile

Reviewed in the United States on October 8, 2023

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Think of Agatha Christie and what do you think of? Poirot and Marple? Death and mysteries in quaint English villages or exotic locales? You'd be right, of course, at least to a large extent. But that would also be to overlook other parts of her output. Something that would include 1944's Death Comes as the End, in which Christie might very well have invented the historical whodunit.

Given that Christie's second husband was an archeologist, it makes sense for there to be at least one novel of hers set in the past. In this case, Egypt of 2000 B.C. A tale which takes readers into the household of a priest as seen through the eyes of his widowed daughter Renisenb. A household of seeming prosperity and wealth that, of course, hides underlying tensions well. Tensions that explode with the arrival of a younger concubine and a series of events that her death sets in motion.

Set in Ancient Egypt, Death Comes as the End is a curious piece of the Christie bibliography. Her attention to detail, recapturing the sights and sounds of that ancient culture, making it easy for the reader to put themselves in Renisenb's place. Something that is also helped by the richness of the characterizations of her family. Indeed, the family dramas and power struggles prove the more things change, the more they stay the same. To the point, in fact, that there's times the novel is more of a historical fiction work than a whodunit, it's so well done. At least for the most part as there's the odd moment where Christie's dialogue comes across as stilted, but those rate moments don't take much away from the world she created.

Even so, Death Comes as the End contains many of the Christie hallmarks. True, there's the lack of an obvious detective character, with Renisenb taking their place to an extent. Indeed, Renisenb falls into the Christie tradition of reluctant heroine investigators. But it's how the mechanics of the deaths play out in a time and place without modern detection or forensics that makes it a fascinating experience. Reason and logic versus superstition, modernity (for its time) against tradition. All played out across the backdrop of an ancient civilization and death among family members. It's classic Christie, to say the very least.

Something that makes it surprising that the novel has yet to get an adaptation into another medium. Even so, it's an overlooked gem of the Christie canon. A tale of family drama and murder, a long time ago in a faraway land.

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susieque

Agatha Christie fan

Reviewed in the United States on March 21, 2024

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Enjoyed this book due to plot twists Ms. Christie is famous for. Also enjoyed non-traftional setting of ancient Egypt.

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