The Times Discovers Christie

A fun article for the weekend! From In Reference to Murder:

The New York Times took at look at the first mentions of famous authors in the newspaper through the years. Included among those is Agatha Christie, first mentioned in the gossipy Books and Authors column from Aug. 8, 1920, in which the Book Review reported, “An interesting story is told about how ‘The Mysterious Affair at Styles’ by Agatha Christie, a detective novel announced for Fall publication by the John Lane company, came to be written. The author had never before attempted to write a book, but made a wager that she could write a detective story in which the reader would not be able to pick out the murderer, although having knowledge of the same clues as the detective. She was at least successful enough to have her work chosen by The London Times as a serial for its weekly edition.”

I wrote more about Christie’s Styles in this CrimeReads piece.