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By the Pricking of My Thumbs

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By the Pricking of My Thumbs

By: Agatha Christie
Narrated by: Hugh Fraser
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About this listen

The third Tommy & Tuppence novel.

When Tommy and Tuppence visited an elderly aunt in her gothic nursing home, they thought nothing of her mistrust of the doctors; after all, Ada was a very difficult old lady.

But when Mrs Lockett mentioned a poisoned mushroom stew and Mrs Lancaster talked about ‘something behind the fireplace’, Tommy and Tuppence found themselves caught up in an unexpected adventure involving possible black magic…

©1968 Agatha Christie Limited. A Chorion Company. All rights reserved (P)2006 HarperCollins Publishers Ltd, London UK Mystery Suspense Thriller & Suspense Traditional Detectives Fiction Detective

Critic Reviews

"The most macabre and eerie Christie I have read for a long time." (Sunday Express)

"Ladies disappearing from homes of rest, sinister empty houses, hints of gang-leaders mixed with black magic: mystery at the usual high Christie level." (Evening Standard)

"All beautifully plotted in the way that Mrs Christie is famous for. The title is from Macbeth: 'By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes.' Wicked indeed!" (Best Sellers)
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love a good murder mystery . plenty of twists and turns down the garden path here. light easy with a touch of post war cold war old boys spy games. found myself drawn to this book. Read perfectly by Hugh ,aka Hastings to add a splash of authenticity.

fetch the shovel to collect the bodies

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Solid narration of a classic Christy. Sometimes I struggle with the racism in AC’s work but luckily this book didn’t have any, that I noticed. I rather enjoyed following Tuppence on her adventure that started as a hunch and ballooned into a conspiracy. Very enjoyable twist at the end. A good choice for a fun halloween listen.

Good clean fun

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Setting was clever, good character description. Beginning was great and engaging. Who’d have thought of a murderess in an old people’s home except Agatha Christie funny too. Appealed to different emotions.

Relationships /love/persisstance/Creepiness. Pricking of my thumbs. Mystery

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Firstly, this book was written later in the author’s career and her dementia is quite evident by the rambling storyline. It’s pretty much just a bunch of old ramblly people talking bonded about people and things, most of which have nothing to do with the storyline. Really shows how the publisher saw the author as a money machine. This book could do with some really strong editing, but I don’t believe even that would redeem it. The narrator (Hugh Fraser) has been one of my favourites with his earlier narrations. However, as he’s gotten older, his consonants are quite inarticulate. His character voices/accents are also really hard to understand in this book. Finally, the book is really hard to navigate. There are no clear chapters in the audio book. There are 6 audiobook chapters which are exactly as they were when the book was made for cd. Each file starts mid chapter. And there are multiple chapters in each file and it’s hard to know where they start and end. Do not recommend at all.

Narrator mumbly, story rambling bad quality file

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This is just a compilation of the books. A money grab with no extra content. I'm very disappointed.

just a compilation of the books. money grab

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