Agatha Christie’s Poirot: Errata

Although it would be lovely to write a book free from errors of any kind, unfortunately they do creep in when writing about a topic that covers more than a century and draws on hundreds (if not thousands) of sources. I believe in being transparent about corrections, and so here are mine for Agatha Christie’s Poirot! I have not included minor issues such as a few words missing their italicisation, some misplaced punctuation, and a few sentences that have been tweaked for clarity or tidiness.

Some of these have already been corrected for the second or third printings. Others will be fixed for any subsequent printings, including the paperback.

p.45: ‘quite be’ should be ‘be quite’ in the quote

p.82: The summary is misleading as it makes it sound like Poirot was not at the first poisoning but was at the second, when it is the other way round

p.110 & 390: ‘The Second Gong’ was actually first published in Ladies’ Home Journal in the US. The publication in The Strand was a month later (and was its UK debut).

p.140: Simeon Lee is locked inside his ‘room’ not study (which we learn is a separate space)

p.208: ‘be’ should not be in the quote ‘part of the mind to be concentrate’

p.216: ‘Italian proprietor’ should be ‘Cypriot proprietor’

p.274: ‘possibly consider if any of them…’ should say ‘possibly ask if any of them…’ in the quote

p.278: For clarity, ‘just as in the last Poirot book’ should probably read ‘just as in the previous Poirot book’

p.385: ‘increased to commission’ should be ‘increased the commission’

p.410: Helen Baxendale played Elizabeth Cole, not Judith Hastings

Various: ‘Arbuthnott’ should be ‘Arbuthnot’

Also, I didn’t write the captions but there are a few corrections for them as well:

p.91: The Tom Adams cover for Death in the Clouds predates 1974 – possibly 1971

p.189: Caption should say the cover is by Ian Robinson (not Tom Adams) and apparently it is from 1966

p.319: This is arguable, but some may consider that there were four covers for this Curtain paperback, not three, although it is possible/likely that one of these was only used for the (quickly produced) second printing

p.375: Caption should say the photo is from Peril at End House, not ‘The Cornish Mystery’

Thanks to Peter Sheeran, Sven Pehla, Tony Medawar, Kate Jackson and David Morris for first spotting some of these errors.