At Bertram's Hotel (Miss Marple) by Agatha Christie.

 

At Bertram's Hotel (Miss Marple) by Agatha Christie.

This edition published 22nd March 2018 by Harper Fiction.

From the cover of the book:

A grand old London hotel.
A series of alarming coincidences.
Danger lurking down every corridor.

Impeccable service. Luxurious rooms. Eccentric guests. There are worse places for Canon Pennyfather to find himself stranded than Bertram’s Hotel.

But when he gets his dates in a muddle and attempts to travel to Lucerne a day too late, he unwittingly sets off a violent chain of events.

And Miss Marple is convinced there is more going on than meets the eye.

Never underestimate Miss Marple...

***********

When Miss Marple's nephew Raymond offers to pay for her to have a little holiday, she rejects all suggestions for seas-side situations and countryside climes in favour of a location from her past - Bertram's Hotel in Mayfair.

Miss Marple is astounded to find that the hotel has barely changed from the place she visited in her childhood, still with the luxurious rooms and impeccable service she remembers well, not to mention the kind of food the has long been absent from the menus of more modern establishments. She settles down to enjoy her stay in London with relish in the steady company of wealthy tourists, old-fashioned upper class types, country squires, retired military sorts, and aged clergymen, but before long she starts to feel uncomfortable. There is something not quite right about Bertram's, almost as if this is all some sort of performance.

When Miss Marple's fellow guest, the very forgetful Canon Pennyfather goes missing after mixing up his dates about a conference in Lucerne, a series of events is set in motion that exposes the evil that stalks the corridors of this Hotel. For Bertram's is indeed not quite the respectable concern it appears to be...

In At Bertram's Hotel, we find Miss Marple in a reflective mood as she harks back to her childhood visit to this grand old establishment. Although she finds London itself changed in many ways, she is enchanted to discover that the hotel is very much as she remembers it. However, her mood begins to change once she casts her highly observant eye over the comings, goings, and odd coincidences at Bertram's. 

While Miss Marple sits in the hotel lounge, quietly doing her knitting, and taking everything in as she does, we meet some interesting characters, and Christie being Christie, everyone has a role to play in how the story unfurls. The staff do seem a little shady once you dig under the surface a little, especially the mysterious Mr Humfries, the hotel manager; the unshakable Miss Gorringe on Reception; and Michael "Micky" Gorman, the commissionaire; but it is the guests that really hold your attention, with the daring, and much married, Lady Bess Sedgewick; the young, pretty Honourable Elvira Blake; and dotty Canon Pennyfather central to the story. Add in a thoroughly dirty dog in the form of handsome racing driver Ladislaus Malinowski; and wily old Chief-Inspector Fred "Father" Davy, and we have the makings of something really rather special.

Beyond the confines of the hotel, where Miss Marple's nose for trouble tells her that something dodgy is going on, there is quite a lot of build up around a Scotland Yard investigation into the activities of a criminal gang responsible for a spate of audacious robberies somehow involving the unlikely appearance of pillars of the legal, military, and ecclesiastical communities. "Father" has his suspicions about how this the gang might be operating, but it is not until Canon Pennyfather goes missing that he starts to get ideas around how Bertram's Hotel might be involved and who the brains of the outfit could be. Of course, once he meets the very special Miss Marple and they put their heads together, it becomes possible to get to the bottom of the mystery.

This is rather an interesting story when it comes to Christie, because there aren't really that many red herrings to clear out of the way before the truth emerges. There are mysteries to solve, but ultimately they all point towards the things that you begin to suspect quite early on in the story, and it is just a matter of finding the proof to back up your ideas. The ending is also on the 'threads left hanging' side, which is uncharacteristic of Christie. However, I did enjoy the way the story comes together very much, and there is quite a lot of exciting action and derring-do along the way, which contrasts nicely with the softly-softly nature of Miss Marple's methods.

Miss Marple's way of working is certainly very different to my firm favourite Hercule Poirot's, but I am fast coming to appreciate that how she solves crime is every bit as enjoyable as dear old Hercule's, even though is it much more gentle and circuitous. I love how she plays up the harmless old lady act to her advantage, while secretly being very wise and incredibly sharp at ferreting out wrongdoing, and she definitely has an edge of Poirot when it comes to human nature. It seems Jane Marple is rapidly working her way into my affections!

At Bertram's Hotel is my July choice for the #ReadChristie2022 challenge, as 'a story which takes place on holiday'. As usual, I alternated between reading the book and listening to the audio book, which in this case was beautifully narrated by Stephanie Cole - who does a sterling job with all the many voices, especially Miss Marple herself. Highly recommended if audio books are your thing!

 At Bertram's Hotel is available to buy now in multiple formats.

About the author:

Agatha Christie is known throughout the world as the Queen of Crime. Her books have sold over a billion copies in English with another billion in over 70 foreign languages. She is the most widely published author of all time and in any language, outsold only by the Bible and Shakespeare. She is the author of 80 crime novels and short story collections, 20 plays, and six novels written under the name of Mary Westmacott.