“Five Little Pigs” by Agatha Christie – Poirot’s Cold Case

It seems that practically every famous detective and sleuth in literature must, at one point or another, solve a case from a long-forgotten past.

I guess there is some kind of mysterious attraction to such topics; as time passes by, events get increasingly blurred and there are less and less ways of finding out the truth.

However, such things never stood in the way of famous Belgian sleuth, Hercule Poirot, especially not when he was solving the murder Amyas Crayle in Five Little Pigs, written by none other than Agatha Christie.

Just to give you a brief idea of the premise, Amyas Crayle, a brilliant painter, is found murdered and his wife was quickly arrested and condemned as the culprit. However, she still has a daughter who, upon turning of age, received a letter in which her mother professed her innocence.

Naturally, the daughter turns to Hercule Poirot for help with her complex case, and he must solve the crime with very little evidence. As a matter of fact, all he really has are the stories of the five people who were there when it happened.

To get the most obvious out of the way, as usual, Agatha Christie manages to deliver a solid and intriguing story in which every single detail matters. As usual, the reader is given the same chance as Poirot to solve the crime.

All the information you need and get is in the five stories of those who were there, and that’s all Poirot gets as well. As a matter of fact, once you have read all of them I recommend you put down the book and try to solve things on your own, comparing your results with what Christie had in mind.

One of the most interesting aspects of the book were the characters. In most Christie novels, the characters feel generic, predictable and two-dimensional, but in this case, they have a lot of depth and complexity.

It actually makes me believe that Christie held back on developing the characters in her other books on purpose. There are plenty of details given in each story that make these characters relatable, and that serves to further blur the lines between real and false.

All in all, if you enjoy carefully-crafted murder mysteries (especially ones involving Poirot), deep character developing and getting a fair crack at solving the case, Five Little Pigs will definitely be your cup of tea.

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Agatha Christie (15 September 1890 – 12 January 1976) Personal site Agatha Christie is thought of by many as being the grandmother of murder mysteries. Throughout her novels, which include the classics And Then There Were None and Death on the Nile, Christie developed many groundbreaking techniques for her time, most of which are being used in one way or another by modern murder mystery writers.