Three Act Tragedy

I rattled through this one in a few days, an enjoyable light read with an interesting cast of characters headed up by Sir Charles Cartwright, playing his role as head of the cast. Poirot doesn't make an entrance until almost half way through but in truth I didn't miss his early input too much as the amateur sleuths did their bit until Poirot makes the grand entrance to pull everything together.

1935年出版、初期の傑作を次々出してる頃だが、すこし凝り過ぎで作品全体のインパクトを損なった感じがする。西洋演劇は五幕が定型なので三幕とはとはどういうことか？と読み始めたが、早々に事件が起き、すぐ続いて第二の事件が、という連続殺人事件で、状況はパーティの最中で、皆が見ている中でといういつものパタンで、犯人はこの中にいるといういつもの展開ですが・・・捜査は参加者の数名が行い、ポワロは助言をしつつ加わる。最後は思わぬ展開になるものの、事件、展開、ドン電返しの各面で少しずつパンチに欠ける。登場人物もインパクトがイマイチだし、幾つか設定されているred herring（まやかし）がメチャクチャまやかしだろ！！しかし、クリスティーファンの皆様には、いろんな手法、登場人物、構想に果敢に挑戦している若きクリスティー女史の姿が好ましく浮かぶのではないでしょうか。

After confining Poirot and his suspects to a railway carriage then providing a compassionate ending for her last book, Agatha goes to the other extreme in Three Act Tragedy. Devon, Yorkshire, and Monte Carlo provide the settings for what is surely Christie’s most callous murder.Two unexpected deaths at separate parties raise actor Sir Charles Cartwright’s suspicions that they might not be due to natural causes. His concerns are justified when forensic tests confirm both victims died from nicotine poisoning and the second victim’s butler disappears. Sir Charles believes the missing butler is a key suspect and he’s joined by two friends who help him investigate. But they can’t trace the butler, struggle to establish a motive, and fail to find any evidence of how the poison was used.Poirot, who has been largely absent up to this point (which is over halfway through the book), unexpectedly returns from a break in Monte Carlo to make sense of everything. And despite the murder of a third person (because they knew nothing!?), he draws conclusions that are quite chilling.As you might expect with an Agatha Christie novel, Three Act Tragedy is ingenious, full of misdirection, and the murderer is supremely well hidden in plain sight. Poirot’s involvement is uncharacteristically minimal but his impact is dramatic and the ending put me off dinner parties for life.

Three Act Tragedy is an interesting and refreshingly different Christie novel. Poirot himself only appears as a minor character until the end and much of the legwork is done by a team of enthusiastic amateurs who were witnesses to the first crime.The act structure seems a little out of place in a novel and somewhat forced perhaps to fit the title, the first two acts being mostly taken up with the setting up of the plot. The final act is almost the entire second half of the novel, and it is here that I found the story picking up.The cast of characters is nicely varied, and the setting more loose than many of Christie's mysteries, with the investigators travelling to meet each of the well rounded but equally implausible suspects. I did get a slight inkling of who the perpetrator might be but was by no means certain once the time came for the big reveal. My one complaint would be that the killer's motive jars rather with some of their other activity in the novel, making it seem slightly less plausible.Overall I enjoyed this book, which was presented with a much less formal style than some others, possibly due to the new choice of protagonist being somewhat different to Poirot's usual companions (I have since read that he has actually appeared in a number of other Christie stories without Poirot). Christie also manages to weave in a quite plausible love story to keep the characters distinct and alive.

Christy keeps you guessing.it makes for a fun read.