And Then There Were None

Notes

And Then There Were None was initially published in the U.K. in 1939; Agatha Christie named it after the song “Ten Little Niggers” (the rhyme serves as a significant plot element). A year later, it was re-published in the U.S. entitled “And Then There Were None” — the last five words of the same song.

Despite the title, the novel became the world’s best-selling mystery, selling over 100 million copies. It is worth reading to understand all the fuss.

Publisher’s Synopsis

‘We’re not going to leave the island. None of us will ever leave. It’s the end, you see – the end of everything…’

1939. Europe teeters on the brink of war. Ten strangers are invited to Soldier Island, an isolated rock near the Devon coast. Cut off from the mainland, with their generous hosts Mr and Mrs U.N. Owen mysteriously absent, they are each accused of a terrible crime. When one of the party dies suddenly they realise they may be harbouring a murderer among their number.

The 10 strangers include a reckless playboy, a troubled Harley Street doctor, a formidable judge, an uncouth detective, an unscrupulous mercenary, a God-fearing spinster, two restless servants, a highly decorated general and an anxious secretary. One by one they are picked off. Who will survive? And who is the killer? Copies of an ominous nursery rhyme hang in each room, the murders mimicking the awful fates of its ‘Ten Little Soldier Boys’.

Read a full review of And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie at Pretty Books.