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Published in 1930, The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett is gritty, gripping noir at its best. As far as detective stories go, this one’s a game changer.

Detective Sam Spade’s cool, cynical nature turned him into one of the most memorable characters in literature and film, most notably the 1941 release starring Humphrey Bogart. Both the book and the movie are stunners.

Read: Buy it used or new on Amazon. (Read time: ~4 hours)

Reflect: Check out the conversation starters below.

Meet our guest:
Mike Nugent has worked as a lawyer, lobbyist, litigator and business executive in the
technology, intellectual property and financial services fields, and has always worked at being a writer. He has self-published three political mystery novels and has a fourth about to be submitted. He has self-published a children’s book and has had several short stories published in various journals in the US and abroad, one of which he’s turned into a short screenplay. One of his books was a Writers &  Readers Magazine’s Authorlink! Featured Thriller for two straight months and another made it to the semifinalist round in the 2015 James Jones First Novel Fellowship contest, meaning it was selected in the top 30 of over 675 submissions.

Mike’s work can be found at amazon.com/author/pmnugent.
https://www.facebook.com/pmnudge

Mike is a member of Lighthouse Writers’ Workshop in Denver, Colorado where he completed a 2-year Book Project program on writing novels led by 2023 Edgar Award winner Erika Krouse.
He lives near the Jersey Shore.

WRITING STYLE + NOIR MYSTERY: Spade’s gruff “matter of fact” voice lacks any sign of emotion and seems hyper-masculine, modern, and American. The Maltese Falcon’s mystery at the center of the story – how is it different from prior (pre-1929) mystery styles? Does it hold up? Do Hammett’s writing craft, methods, and tricks work? 

SANITARIUMS, SAN QUENTIN & SAN FRANCISCO: Spade tells Brigid, “Most things in San Francisco can be bought, or taken.” (Ch.6) How important is the novel’s setting in The Maltese Falcon?

“Cold steamy air blew in through two open windows, bringing with it half a dozen times a minute the Alcatraz foghorn’s dull moaning. A tinny alarm-clock, insecurely mounted on a corner of Duke’s Celebrated Criminal Cases of America—face down on the table—held its hands at five minutes past two.” (Ch.2)

“This is my city and my game. I could manage to land on my feet—sure—this time, but the next time I tried to put over a fast one they’d stop me so fast I’d swallow my teeth. Hell with that. You birds’ll be in New York or Constantinople or some place else. I’m in business here.” (Ch.18)

SAM SPADE: He’s 6’ tall and “looked rather pleasantly like a blond satan.” What’s his moral code? Is it hard (impossible?) to have one in so violent a world as the one in The Maltese Falcon? In Ch.12, he says he’s “no damned good.” Is that true? Is he a hero? Anti-hero?

“It’s tough, him getting it like that. Miles had his faults same as the rest of us, but I guess he must’ve had some good points too.” [Tom Polhaus speaking]

“I guess so,” Spade agreed in a tone that was utterly meaningless ….” (Ch.2)

“Have the Spade & Archer taken off the door and Samuel Spade put on.” (Ch.3) 

Spade stopped pacing the floor. He put his hands on his hips and glared at the girl. He addressed her in a loud savage voice: “Nobody followed her. Do you think I’m a God-damned schoolboy? I made sure of it before I put her in the cab, I rode a dozen blocks with her to be more sure, and I checked her another half-dozen blocks after I got out.” 

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Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett (1929) marked Hammett’s transition from short stories to novels. His portrayal of the Continental Op as a “hard-boiled” detective eventually became a prototype for many detective stories to come. A former detective, Hammett knew his stuff.

Read: Buy it used or on Amazon. (Reading time: ~4 hours)

Reflect: Check out the conversation starters below.

A+ Detective Work

“What kind of gunman would use a .32 [to kill Donald Willsson]?” (Albury used the bank gun; he knew about certified check; he called Mrs. Willsson and Whisper.)

“[Tim Noonan] didn’t say Whisper. I’ve heard women call Thaler Max, but I’ve never heard a man here call him anything but Whisper. Tim didn’t say Max. He said MacS—the first part of MacSwain—and died before he could finish it.”

The old man laughed savagely and began blustering again. …

I laughed at him. Now I had it. The old boy was scared stiff. Fright was the something behind his clowning. That was why he blustered, and why he wouldn’t let them take the body away. He wanted it there to look at, to keep panic away, visible proof of his ability to defend himself. I knew where I stood.

The Op’s Goal: Harvest

The Op’s job is technically over after he figures out that Albury murdered Donald (roughly 1/3 the way through the book). Yet the Op decides to stay in town to clean up the city. The word “harvest” is used metaphorically to refer to the Continental Op’s retributive and diabolical plan to turn everyone against each other.

“I don’t like the way Poisonville has treated me. I’ve got my chance now, and I’m going to even up. … You want to be let alone. There was a time when I wanted to be let alone. If I had been, maybe now I’d be riding back to San Francisco. But I wasn’t. Especially I wasn’t let alone by that fat Noonan. He’s had two tries at my scalp in two days. … Now it’s my turn to run him ragged, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do. Poisonville is ripe for the harvest. It’s a job I like, and I’m going to it.” (Op to Dinah)

The Op’s Plan: Turn the Thugs Against One Other

“Personville had only some forty thousand inhabitants. It shouldn’t be hard to spread news. Ten o’clock found me out spreading it.”

Noonan says: “Everybody’s killing everybody. Where’s it going to end? I’m sick of this butchering. I can’t stand any more of it.” The Op manipulates Noonan, suggesting a “peace conference out of which at least a dozen killings ought to grow.” Noonan, Elihu, Whisper, Pete the Finn, and Reno Starkey attend. Elihu suggests a frank conversation “without turning Personville into a slaughterhouse.”

“I’ve got to have a wedge that can be put between Pete and Yard, Yard and Noonan, Pete and Noonan, Pete and Thaler …. If we can smash things up enough—break the combination—they’ll have their knives in each other’s backs, doing our work for us.”

“[E]verybody sat around and behaved and watched everybody else while I juggled death and destruction.” (20.32)

Is the Op cleaning up Personville, or is he complicit in poisoning Personville? Is he a hero? An antihero? Something else altogether?

The Fascinating Femme Fatale

A femme fatale (“deadly woman”) is attractive, aggressive, and sexually provocative. In Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett, Dinah uses her charms to serve her own interests, but Hammett complicates her in surprising ways. Dinah has lots of “boyfriends,” including the narrator, but there’s zero sexual tension. She also doesn’t look like the typical femme fatale. Why is she so obsessed with getting more money? How do you feel about Dinah – and why?

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Welcome to the Tea, Tonic & Toxin book club and podcast! Our focus is the history of mystery. We’re reading and discussing the best mysteries, detective stories, and thrillers ever written.

Time Magazine included Red Harvest as one of the 100 Best English-Language Novels from 1923-2005, noting Dashiell Hammett created the prototype for the hard-boiled sleuth.

The book surely belongs on any list of the best crime fiction ever written. The morally ambiguous Continental Op and the self-serving Dinah Brand are amazing characters, to boot.

Read: Buy it used or on Amazon. (Reading time: ~4 hours)

Reflect: Check out the conversation starters below.

Language, Voice, and Tone

• Hammett had worked as an operative for Pinkerton’s National Detective Agency. The narrator is an operative (PI) of the Continental Detective Agency’s San Francisco office. He’s one of the first hardboiled detectives, followed by Hammett’s Sam Spade, Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe, and many others.
• “Poisonville’s prize fighting was done in a big wooden ex-casino in what had once been an amusement park on the edge of town. When I got there at eight-thirty, most of the population seemed to be on hand, packed tight in close rows of folding chairs on the main floor, packed tighter on benches in two dinky balconies. Smoke. Stink. Heat. Noise.”
• In an Atlantic essay, Ted Gioia talks about the transition from an Anglocentric to an American world. “No one told stories in that crisp, uncluttered way before 1926 [publication year of The Sun Also Rises]. But soon, other ways of pushing a narrative forward would seem slow-paced and old-fashioned.”

Booze and Blood

Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett is set during Prohibition (1919-1933), which banned the manufacture, transport, and sale of alcohol. This ban led to unprecedented levels of organized crime. Racketeering and bootlegging became widespread problems across the US.

Characters drink constantly, including the Op, who always carries a flask of Scotch. The entire town revolves around the black market. The Op also drinks laudanum (opium tincture) with Dinah the night after the big meeting with all the local gangsters.

In 1921, “To beat the miners [and end a labor strike], [Elihu] had to let his hired thugs run wild. … They took the city for their spoils.” Personville becomes Poisonville when lives are expendable. “[S]warthy foreign-looking men in laborers’ clothes” are used as decoys, and they’re all killed. Home isn’t a sanctuary. No one is safe indoors or out.

In Personville, Honest Man → Cop → Criminal

What is it about being in Personville that turns a cop into a criminal? Do they see too much corruption and become disillusioned? Is the lust for power contagious? Is it possible for a code of ethics to exist in a place as corrupt as Personville?

Dinah says: “I knew the dick—MacSwain. […] He had been a pretty good guy, straight as ace-deuce-trey-four-five, till he got on the force. Then he went the way of the rest of them. (11)

The Perfect Guy for the Cleanup Job

In Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett, Elihu Willsson hires the Op to clean up Personville. The Op agrees so long as he can “have a free hand—no favors to anybody—run the job as I pleased.” Only a stranger like the Op has no motives tied to the town. The Op is the only person in Poisonville who can rid the city of its crime.

What’s his attitude toward power and wealth? What’s his moral code? 

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The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (1926) has become known as one of Agatha Christie’s most controversial novels due to an unexpected stunner of a twist at the end. Christie considered it her masterpiece.

In 2013, the British Crime Writers’ Association voted it the best crime novel ever written.

Read: Buy it used, read it for free, or get it on Amazon. (Reading time: ~4 hours)

Reflect: Check out the conversation starters below.

Weigh In: Share your thoughts using the comments below!

Our guest: Simon Eli Milliman - aka the mythical white panther who cries.
Host of the podcast Everything I Hate About Me.
Urban Jack of Urban Jack Productions

Check out these Marrow recipes from the BBC and get in touch with your inner HP!

Obsession, Guilt, and Redemption: Mrs. Ferrars and Dr. Sheppard relentlessly pursue their desires, even at the cost of their health, morality, and sanity. Compulsive behavior drives people to commit acts they might not otherwise consider, leading to tragic outcomes. Mrs. Ferrars grapples with guilt and the need for redemption; Dr. Sheppard arguably does not. Past actions haunt them nonetheless. Their choices have consequences.

“not that I take any responsibility for Mrs. Ferrar’s death. It was the direct consequence of her own actions. I feel no pity for her. I have no pity for myself either.”

A woman trapped in an abusive marriage murders her husband. Roger Ackroyd was horrified. How do you feel? Is there any quarter for pity here?

A woman trapped in an abusive marriage murders her husband. You see an opening to take advantage of this knowledge. Do you consider blackmail? How do you approach it?

Shepherd has no pity for himself either. How is this possible? Is he truly this consistent in his “weakness?” It’s fair, but is it possible?

When do you pity yourself?

The Big Reveal: 

“A person who was at the Three Boars earlier that day, a person who knew Ackroyd well enough to know that he had purchased a dictaphone, a person who was of a mechanical turn of mind, who had the opportunity to take the dagger from the silver table before Miss Flora arrived, who had with him a receptacle suitable for hiding the dictaphone—such as a black bag, and who had the study to himself for a few minutes after the crime was discovered while Parker was telephoning for the police. In fact—Dr. Sheppard!”

My first time reading this book I was completely stumped and never saw it coming. Were you surprised?

I wondered what my second reading would be like. I rarely read or watch things a second time. Would it feel just as obfuscated to me as before? I was surprised to find it glaring off the pages! Page after page, she points to the doctor. If you’ve read it more than once, how was your second reading?

Is it really just the concept of the unreliable narrator that makes one so blind to the possibility that Sheppard did it?

Diabolical Doctors: Whose Body and The Murder of Roger Ackroyd have had the admired doctor as the murderer. Is it because no one would suspect him? Or because everyone should suspect him?  A man with a lot of knowledge & opportunity.

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The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (1926) has become known as one of Agatha Christie’s most controversial novels due to an unexpected stunner of a twist at the end. Christie considered it her masterpiece.

In 2013, the British Crime Writers’ Association voted it the best crime novel ever written.

Read: Buy it used, read it for free, or get it on Amazon. (Reading time: ~4 hours)

Reflect: Check out the conversation starters below.

Weigh In: Share your thoughts using the comments below!

Our guest: Simon Eli Milliman - aka the mythical white panther who cries.
Host of the podcast Everything I Hate About Me.
Urban Jack of Urban Jack Productions

Check out these Marrow recipes from the BBC and get in touch with your inner HP!

We All Have Something to Hide: Things aren’t always as they seem. Characters present themselves in one way but hide their true intentions and true selves beneath the surface. We all have something to hide, don’t we?

“Every one of you in this room is concealing something from me.” He raised his hand as a faint murmur of protest arose. “Yes, yes, I know what I am saying. It may be something unimportant—trivial—which is supposed to have no bearing on the case, but there it is. Each one of you has something to hide.”

What on Earth Is a Vegetable Marrow? A marrow is a cucurbit, which means it’s from the same family as the melon, cucumber, squash and courgette (zucchini). The marrow is actually a courgette that has been left on the plant to grow a little longer; likewise, if you pick a marrow when small, it’s classed as a courgette. Marrow has a creamy flesh, edible skin and seeds, and a mild flavour.

You can steam, bake, boil, fry or roast marrow. The stripy skin is edible, but if you are roasting or frying you might want to remove the seeds and stringy middles so you can just enjoy the flesh.

Have you ever eaten vegetable marrow? Do you garden? Have you ever given yourself over to gardening a single vegetable as an all-consuming hobby? If you were to garden a single food, what would that food be?

The Mongoose: Rudyard Kipling’s story “Ricki-Ticki-Tavi” is referenced, part of The Jungle Book (a story dear to my heart, having recently read it to my son). “Go & find out” or sit placidly at home and find out. Are you familiar with either of these two types of personalities? Do you have one?

The Intelligence Corps: Miss Marple: Agatha Christie said Caroline was her favorite character and her inspiration to create the character of Miss Marple. How do you feel about Caroline? Have you read any Miss Marple?

“I was able to set M. Poirot right upon several points. He was very grateful to me. He said I had the makings of a born detective in me—and a wonderful ​​psychological insight into human nature.”

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by Dorothy Sayers

Dorothy Sayers’ Whose Body? is the first of 16 detective novels published by Sayers, one of the queens of the Golden Age of Detective Fiction.

This 1923 novel introduces Lord Peter Wimsey, considered the father of the amateur “gentleman sleuth” who will appear in many British novels for decades to come.

Read: Buy it used, read it for free, or get it on Amazon. (Reading time: ~4 hours)

Reflect: Check out the conversation starters below.

Weigh In: Share your thoughts using the form below!

THE GAME IS AFOOT … BUT SHOULD IT BE A GAME? So much to unpack here … For one thing, Wimsey seems self-aware. For another, Parker seems to have no qualms about calling him out. It’s a great scene in Whose Body?

ASSOCIATIONS AND RIDDLES – “Thing I object to in detective stories,” said Mr. Piggott, “is the way fellows remember every bloomin’ thing that’s happened to ’em within the last six months. They’re always ready with their time of day and was it rainin’ or not, and what were they doin’ on such an’ such a day. Reel it all off like a page of poetry. But one ain’t like that in real life … One day’s so like another, I’m sure I couldn’t remember—well, I might remember yesterday, p’r’aps, but I couldn’t be certain about what I was doin’ last week if I was to be shot for it.”

… “But they don’t really get it like that, you know. I mean, a man doesn’t just say, ‘Last Friday I went out at 10 a.m. to buy a mutton chop. As I was turning into Mortimer Street I noticed a girl of about twenty-two with black hair and brown eyes, wearing a green jumper, check skirt, Panama hat and black shoes, riding a Royal Sunbeam Cycle at about ten miles an hour turning the corner by the Church of St. Simon and St. Jude on the wrong side of the road riding towards the market place!’ It amounts to that, of course, but it’s really wormed out of him by a series of questions.”

Then Wimsey and Parker worm the details out of Piggott through a series of questions. 

CORPSES FOR MEDICAL RESEARCH AND SCIENTIFIC STUDY – In Whose Body?, we learn that bodies used for medical research were usually vagrants supplied by the workhouses and free hospitals. Whoa.

PANIC ATTACKS AND PTSD – So, such much to unpack here. What, if anything, surprised you about these scenes? Did Wimsey’s experience seem real to you?

WHAT DOES “BEING USEFUL” LOOK LIKE? What do we learn from the scene below? What does being useful actually look like? Is Gerald useful? Is the Duchess useful? How about Lord Peter Wimsey? Are you useful? Am I?

THE STRANGE + CREEPY SIR JULIAN FREKE – Carolyn would argue Freke made roughly 142 bad decisions, any one of which might have made him a suspect. (He swapped the bodies, risked being seen or heard by his servants, risked being seen in the Levy house, risked being seen as he deposited the body in a random bathtub …)

Tea, Tonic, and Toxin is a book club and podcast for people who love mysteries, thrillers, introspection, and good conversation. Each month, your hosts, Sarah Harrison and Carolyn Daughters, will discuss a game-changing mystery or thriller from the 19th and 20th centuries. Together, we’ll see firsthand how the genre evolved.

Along the way, we’ll entertain ideas, prospects, theories, doubts, and grudges, along with the occasional guest. And we hope to entertain you, dear friend. We want you to experience the joys of reading some of the best mysteries and thrillers ever written.

Visit Carolyndaughters.com for Brand therapy. Persuasive writing courses. Fractional chief marketing officer (CMO) strategy for startups. Let’s win hearts and minds by telling the best story possible.

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Welcome to the Tea, Tonic & Toxin book club and podcast! We’re reading and discussing the best mysteries and detective stories ever written.

Whose Body? (1921) is the first of 16 detective novels published by Sayers, one of the queens of the Golden Age of Detective Fiction. The story introduces Lord Peter Wimsey, considered the father of the amateur “gentleman sleuth” who will appear in many British novels for decades to come.

Can Wimsey solve a seemingly unsolvable murder? Can you?

Here are some conversation starters and questions here. Please also share your thoughts using the form above!

IS LORD PETER WIMSEY A “TYPICAL ARISTOCRAT”? Did you find Wimsey delightful? Did he bug you? Did he seem like a “typical aristocrat,” or did he seem more complex? Were you able to identify with him? In what ways — and why?

IS BUNTER A TYPICAL SERVANT? What is a “typical servant,” and does Bunter fit that bill? Is Bunter better off than Wimsey (as Wimsey suggests)? In what ways does Bunter hearken back to old-fashioned norms? In what ways is Bunter possibly ahead of his time? And what does Bunter really think about anything?

WHAT’S THE DEAL WITH INSPECTOR PARKER? How well do we get to know this guy? What’s his deal? (Throughout Whose Body?, Carolyn kept wanting to know him better.) Are you inclined to like him? Why or why not? (He will return in future stories, including The Nine Tailors.)

DETECTIVE WIMSEY, INSPECTOR PARKER, AND THE BODY IN THE BATH – Wimsey and Parker make quite the detective team. Do they seem on par as detectives, or do they seem Holmes/Watson-like (or Poirot/Hastings-like) to you? What familiar character traits do these two detectives have? What traits make their stand out?

TELLING THE STORY THROUGH DIALOGUE VS. ACTION – Whose Body? contains very little action. Characters sit and talk throughout most of the book. Telling story through action is a much more conventional storytelling technique — Carolyn would argue for good reason.

How did you feel about the dialogue that dominated the pages of Whose Body? Did you want more action? Did you follow the characters’ verbal tics and manners of expression? In what ways did the dialogue engage you or disengage you from the story?

THE DISAPPEARANCE OF REUBEN LEVY: ODE TO TRENT’S LAST CASE – Wealthy business magnate Reuben Levy bears some similarity to Sigsbee Manderson. Levy is the “terrible fighter of the Stock Exchange, who could with one nod set the surly bear dancing, or bring the savage bull to feed out of his hand, whose breath devastated whole districts with famine or swept financial potentates from their seats.” Levy left his home without his watch, checkbook, clothes, or spectacles. And someone impersonated him in his own home.

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The Mysterious Affair at Styles (1920) is the first Hercule Poirot mystery! Can Belgian detective Hercule Poirot solve an unsolvable crime? From the Times Literary Supplement (1921): “[The story] is said to be the result of a bet about the possibility of writing a detective story in which the reader would not be able to spot the criminal. Every reader must admit that the bet was won.”

Read: Buy it used, read it for free, or get it on Amazon. (Reading time: ~4 hours)

Reflect: Check out the conversation starters below.

Weigh In: Share your thoughts using the form below

We're excited to have Jill Carstens as a guest to discuss Agatha Christie's The Mysterious Affair at Styles! Jill is a journalist and an author of narrative nonfiction, and she was also a teacher for 30 years. These days, Jill is concentrating on memoir writing and painting. As she likes to say, "art and words can make a difference." An avid outdoor enthusiast, she has homes in both Denver and Salida, Colorado, where she, her husband, and her son spend as much time outside as possible. 

You can find Jill on Instagram @lettersfrommissjill & @graphittirainbow
Welcome Jill!

A Funny Little Man with a Matter of Method: Hastings notes he “came across a man in Belgium once, a very famous detective …. He was a marvellous little fellow. He used to say that all good detective work was a mere matter of method. … He was a funny little man, a great dandy, but wonderfully clever.” 

Later, Poirot says to Hastings, “Beware! Peril to the detective who says: ‘It is so small—it does not matter. It will not agree. I will forget it.’ That way lies confusion! Everything matters.”

Poirot also tells Hastings, “You gave too much rein to your imagination. Imagination is a good servant, and a bad master. The simplest explanation is always the most likely.”

Let’s talk about Hercule Poirot and his method.

The Worst Proposal Ever?

“Mr. Hastings—you are always so kind, and you know such a lot.”

“It struck me at this moment that Cynthia was really a very charming girl! Much more charming than Mary, who never said things of that kind.”

Hastings proposes. Cynthia laughs and walks away. And Carolyn is confounded by both Hastings and Cynthia. How about you?

Marriage as Escape: “[It] was a very good match for me. … [John] was simply a way of escape from the insufferable monotony of my life. … Don’t misunderstand me. I was quite honest with him. I told him, what was true, that I liked him very much, that I hoped to come to like him more, but that I was not in any way what the world calls ‘in love’ with him. He declared that that satisfied him, and so—we were married.”

Surrounded by Family and Yet Unloved: 

In working so hard to cover tracks, neither Mary nor Lawrence seem to care about saving Mrs. Inglethorp. Hastings at one point asks, “Was the family prostrated by grief? Was the sorrow at Mrs. Inglethorp’s death so great? … The dead woman had not the gift of commanding love. Her death was a shock and a distress, but she would not be passionately regretted.” Mrs. Inglethorp thus dies with no one to truly mourn her. 

Evie says, “Emily was a selfish old woman in her way. She was very generous, but she always wanted a return. She never let people forget what she had done for them—and, that way she missed love. … I was on a different footing. I took my stand from the first. ‘So many pounds a year I’m worth to you. Well and good. … I kept my self-respect. And so, out of the whole bunch, I was the only one who could allow myself to be fond of her.”

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Welcome to the Tea, Tonic & Toxin book club and podcast! We’re reading and discussing the best mysteries and detective stories ever written.

The Mysterious Affair at Styles (1920) is the first Hercule Poirot mystery! From the Times Literary Supplement (1921): The story is “said to be the result of a bet about the possibility of writing a detective story in which the reader would not be able to spot the criminal. Every reader must admit that the bet was won.”

Can Hercule Poirot solve a seemingly unsolvable murder? Can you?

Read: Buy it used, read it for free, or get it on Amazon. (Reading time: ~4 hours)

Reflect: Check out the conversation starters below.

Weigh In: Share your thoughts using the form below!

We're excited to have Jill Carstens as a guest to discuss Agatha Christie's The Mysterious Affair at Styles! Jill is a journalist and an author of narrative nonfiction, and she was also a teacher for 30 years. These days, Jill is concentrating on memoir writing and painting. As she likes to say, "art and words can make a difference." An avid outdoor enthusiast, she has homes in both Denver and Salida, Colorado, where she, her husband, and her son spend as much time outside as possible.

You can find Jill on Instagram @lettersfrommissjill & @graphittirainbow
Welcome Jill!

Here are some questions about the first Hercule Poirot mystery to get you started. Read, reflect, weigh in above, and listen to the podcast!

Period and Setting: The first Hercule Poirot mystery is set during the Great War. We learn that Hastings was injured in the Great War. Mrs. Inglethorp runs dozens (hundreds?) of charitable societies, many of them war related, and she recites a war poem at an evening bazaar. Cynthia works in a dispensary at a Red Cross Hospital. Belgian refugees are in the area, including Poirot. War economies dictate that scrap paper is saved and sent away in sacks for recycling. In the second half of the book, Hastings takes a job at the War Office.

When Hastings first arrives at Styles Court, he writes, “As one looked out over the flat Essex country, lying so green and peaceful under the afternoon sun, it seemed almost impossible to believe that, not so very far away, a great war was running its appointed course. I felt I had suddenly strayed into another world.”

Hastings later notes, “The war was momentarily inactive, and the newspapers seized with avidity on this crime in fashionable life: ‘The Mysterious Affair at Styles’ was the topic of the moment.”

What do you find intriguing, surprising, or unsettling about the period in which the book is set and the book’s Styles Court setting?

Poe’s Narrator vs. Watson vs. Hastings: In what ways do these narrators differ? In what ways are they variations on a theme?

And start with Hastings’ lack of self-awareness. He notes, “I flatter myself that my first judgments are usually fairly shrewd.” He also notes, “The idea crossed my mind … that poor old Poirot was growing old. Privately I thought it lucky that he had associated with him someone of a more receptive type of mind.” And at one point he says, “My system is based on [Poirot’s]—though of course I have progressed rather further.”

And Hastings’ reason for writing: “[In] view of the world-wide notoriety which attended [the case], I have been asked, both by my friend Poirot and the family themselves, to write an account of the whole story. This, we trust, will effectually silence the sensational rumors which still persist.”

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When a freelance spy is murdered in Richard Hannay’s London flat, Richard Hannay goes on the run. Fearing for his life, his goal is to stay one step ahead of both the police and the spies who will stop at nothing to find him.

What are the thirty-nine steps, and can Richard Hannay manage to stay one step ahead of his pursuers? 

Published in 1915, The Thirty-Nine Steps is one of the most popular espionage thrillers ever written.

Read: Buy it used, read it for free, or get it on Amazon. (Reading time: ~4 hours)

Reflect: Check out the conversation starters below.

We're excited to welcome Wendi Anderson as our guest. Wendi is a senior business analyst and an avid outdoor enthusiast. She loves mountain biking, hiking & paddleboarding. In fact, one of her favorite activities is jogging up Green Mountain, elevation 6,800 feet, which isjust steps outside her home in lovely Golden, Colorado. When she's not exploring the great outdoors, watching horror movies, or reading Stephen King novels, she's hanging at home with her husband, two kids and two dogs.

An Ordinary Man as Hero: “Here was I, a very ordinary fellow, with no particular brains, and yet I was convinced that somehow I was needed to help this business through—that without me it would all go to blazes. I told myself it was sheer silly conceit, that … the cleverest people living, with all the might of the British Empire at their back, had the job in hand.”

Not Sherlock: Richard Hannay says, “I wasn’t any kind of Sherlock Holmes. But I have always fancied I had a kind of instinct … I used to use my brains as far as they went, and after they came to a blank wall I guessed, and I usually found my guesses pretty right.”

Scotland Is Dreamy: “We rumbled slowly into a land of little wooded glens and then to a great wide moorland place, gleaming with lochs, with high blue hills showing northwards.” I’m ready to board a plane — how about you?

Tea, Tonic, and Toxin is a book club and podcast for people who love mysteries, thrillers, introspection, and good conversation. Each month, your hosts, Sarah Harrison and Carolyn Daughters, will discuss a game-changing mystery or thriller from the 19th and 20th centuries. Together, we’ll see firsthand how the genre evolved.

Along the way, we’ll entertain ideas, prospects, theories, doubts, and grudges, along with the occasional guest. And we hope to entertain you, dear friend. We want you to experience the joys of reading some of the best mysteries and thrillers ever written.

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