Author Archives: BSamek

Read Charlotte Canelli’s column in the October 19, 2012 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin or listen to the podcast on SoundCloud. Podcasts are archived on the Voices from the Library page of the library website.

On the evening of Friday, December 3, 1926, Agatha Christie disappeared. At the time, she was the well-known author of “The Murder of Roger Ackroyd”, her seventh mystery. Her car was found abandoned several hours after she had announced that she “was going for a drive.” She left several notes; in one to local authorities, she declared that she feared for her life. In another, to a relative of her husband, she stated that she was going on a vacation. Her friends and fans were very confused and they speculated that she might have committed suicide. A local lake, one in which one of the characters in her novels had drowned, was dredged. 15,000 volunteers searched for Ms. Christie high and low.

Although Agatha’s mother had died months before, and admittedly Agatha was suffering from that loss, the story that emerged was that she was actually grief stricken over a very blatant affair that her husband was having. In the end, Agatha might have wanted to publicly embarrass her husband and at the same time escape the humiliation caused by his affair. In any event, husband Archie Christie was forced to travel eleven days after her disappearance to the Old Swan Hydropathic Hotel in Yorkshire, England. His mission? To identify Agatha, a resort guest and an identical match who was refusing to admit she was the one and only Ms. Christie. Or so the mystery goes. (more…)