| Title | : | The Harlequin Tea Set and Other Stories |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0425165159 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780425165157 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 224 |
| Publication | : | First published April 14, 1997 |
The Edge
The Actress
While the Light Lasts
The House of Dreams
The Lonely God
Manx Gold
Within a Wall
The Mystery of the Spanish Chest
The Harlequin Tea Set
The Harlequin Tea Set and Other Stories Reviews
-
The Edge
A chance encounter at a hotel gives a spinster the chance to terrorize the cheating wife of the man she loved. A very good psychological thriller for a short story.
The Actress
A nasty blackmailer is thwarted by a clever actress who is determined to get him out of her life.
Very lighthearted and fun!
While the Light Lasts
What if you had the chance to be with your first love again?
A woman who married wealth and security after her first husband was killed in the war has the chance to revisit her past.
I really enjoyed this haunting short about second chances.
The House of Dreams
This one is admittedly weird.
First published in The Sovereign Magazine in 1926, it's a mash-up of a psychological thriller with a bit of the paranormal, and it really doesn't work all that well.
A man has dreams of a white house and he also feels this love connection to a woman in the story with a family history of mental illness.
In the end,
I'm glad the conclusion had a bit of the sweet stuff but it wasn't the easiest storyline to wrap your head around.
The Lonely God
A little statue of an unnamed god in a museum brings two lonely people together.
It has a very sweet ending.
And I'm not sure what it was about the way Christie told this story, but it made for quite a nice read.
Manx Gold
Two broke cousins are in love. <---hahahaha!
Yes. So they get a message from a rich (dead) relative saying he's got a treasure, and he's going to let the smartest cousin have it. So, these two are working together against their other (shady) cousins to figure out all the clues, find the gold (or whatever), and get enough money so they can marry and have babies with birth defects.
Within a Wall
It's one of those you picked the wrong person stories.
A famous painter adores his beautiful wife but respects the opinions of their plain Jane friend. He is confused by his feelings towards both women and senses something about his wife's spending habits isn't right.
It's a morality tale. I guess?
The Mystery of the Spanish Chest
Poirot must discover who killed a man and stuffed his body into a chest right before an intimate gathering of friends. It seems as though one of the party-goers must have done away with him and just kept on dancing.
The Harlequin Tea Set
Picking up several years after
The Mysterious Mr. Quin, the nice incarnation of Death does his thing once more and helps Mr. Satterthwaite save a family he cares deeply about from some serious grief.
This was a fantastic story to end this collection on and I was very pleased with the outcome.
Recommended for fans of Agatha Christie that are looking for a (mostly) very good set of her short stories. -
#11 in my Agatha Christie Challenge
Well, this is listed as Hercule Poiriot #44 and while there is a HP short story, I felt each of these short stories are worth the reading time. As per my usual style, I will provide a brief synopsis of each story and rate thrm accordingly.
1. The Edge(1927) 4 stars
By a pure accident she had come into possession of facts that affected vitally the man she loved and the woman who she disliked and-----yes, one might as well be frank----of whom she was bitterly jealous. She could ruin that woman. Was she justified in doing this?
A.C. wields the old green eyed monster to explain the conflict between two small village women who love the same men. The climax of the story was pure Christie gold.
2. The Actress (1923) 3 stars
Nancy Taylor! he muttered.By the Lord, little Nancy Taylor!
A down on his luck fella thinks his luck has changed when he spies a woman from his past. The only problem is that she wants her past to stay in the past. A.C left me wondering which of her characters pulled off the more skillful con.
3. While the Light Lasts (1923) 3.5 stars
Even though I had a feeling about how it was going to finish, this particular storyline obviously spun the web for future writers.
4. The House of Dreams (1926) 4 stars
Twists and turns and descents into madness, oh my!
5. The Lonely God (1926) 3.5 stars
Wowza! This took me by surpriseas it was more love story than mystery, but I certainly enjoyed it..
6. Manx Gold (1930) 3.5 stars
Based on actual occurrences, Agatha Christie penned this as part of a commission for an Alderman who wanted to beef up tourism on the Isle of Man. People actually took up the challenge to solve the clues in the story that A.C had left. How cool is that?
7. Within a Wall (1925) 5 stars
It was Mrs. Lempriere who discovered the existence of Jane Haworth.
I won't say too much about the plot but oh my goodness this was AWESOME!
8. The Mystery of the Spanish Chest (1939) 4.5 stars
Our favorite Belgian detective returns! Hercule Poiriot finds himself called to a cocktail party where a recent widow is not convinced the right person has been accused of murdering her husband and asks HP to do his magic. With a little help from Shakespeare, Poiriot solves the case.
9. The Harlequin Tea Set (1971) 3.5 stars
A new to me detective, Mr. Harley Quin finds himself in the midst of a murder plot. -
The only reason this book deserves a 5 star is because it has the last short story Agatha Christie wrote. Most of the stories in this collection have appeared in other collections as well- some are romantic short stories while some are also supernatural themed. One unique story included in the collection is the "Mystery of the Spanish chest" which is an expanded version of the original short story- :Mystery of the Baghdad chest.
-
I just noticed in the author's mini bio in the book jacket that we have the same birth date. It's no wonder I like her! Us Virgo's gotta stick together. (Smiling to myself)
Nine short stories from Miss Agatha Christie. I enjoyed most of them except Manx Gold. My favorite was The Mystery of the Spanish Chest featuring M. Poirot was a nice surprise with a good plot twist. The Actress was also a very fun one to read featuring a blackmailing coward. I really like how she gets to the point and heart of the matter. I find that some authors struggle to get to crux of the plot and then have a lazy ending. She also doesn't lower herself to unnecessary cursing and horror. I will say sometimes she has too many characters to keep up with but that's as far as a criticism I can muster for the Queen of Mystery.
Would recommend for people that love mystery or short stories even if you don't favor Christie. -
This was a nice, diverse set of short stories that show Christie's range of writing. The stories range from the more traditional mysteries Christie is known for to straight up psychological stories to what I might even describe as a Lovecraftian tale. I was also introduced to one of Christie's less well known characters, Harley Quin, who I found delightful. All in all it was a very good listen with some very good stories and some that just fell a bit flat for me. I would say my favorites were 'The Lonely God' and the eponymous 'The Harlequin Tea Set'. The voices were pleasant and did not distract from the stories at all. This is a nice audiobook to while away a car trip with.
-
Okay, I think I get what the fuss is about Agatha Christie now. Hint: the fuss is totally earned.
The Harlequin Tea Set is a collection of rarely published, thematically wide ranging stories. There are, of course, the murder mysteries which she's so famous for, including a story about her famous detective Poirot, The Spanish Chest. But there are also stories which edge into the domain of the supernatural and ephemeral, where some cosmic force is helping move things along to aid or bring justice to a character, stories about love and love lost, of betrayal and guilt. And of course stories about buried treasure.
There is something heavy in Christie's writing that goes beyond just subject matter. There were many times where I felt like I could have been reading Poe or, in the case of The House of Dreams, H.P. Lovecraft - albeit better written than Lovecraft. What surprised me most about Agatha Christie's writing was that, while I could definitely sense the era of the settings, the writing itself was as fresh and clear as though someone had written it now. I can't wait to read some of her full novels. -
I have to say I was really disappointed in this collection as I'm a huge Agatha Christie fan. It is obvious that these are some of her earlier works as they are not as well written, the characters are flat and quite frankly I was able to figure out who 'did it' by the halfway points in these stories. I'd give this one a pass as she has far, far greater books out there than this one.
-
This is a complication of short stories. We meet Harley Quin in the last story. One I’ve read in another collection. I wish there were more of Poirot.
-
A varied mix of genres, and of mixed quality. The title story is a beauty, easily one of Christie's best short stories. Unfortunately, "Manx Gold" is a senseless scavenger hunt story as the 'clues' aren't going to mean anything to a reader: it's a train wreck and among Christie's weakest works. There is even an odd foreword and afterword by Tony Medawar that only adds to the confusion. "The Lonely God" is a simple romantic story: boy meets girl, boy loses girl, then there is a surprise twist. "The Mystery of the Spanish Chest" is typical Christie, a satisfying murder mystery. I must say that Dame Agatha really knew what subjects/ideas make a short story vs a novel vs a stage play. No one would ever accuse her wasted words. Without "Manx Gold", this is a four-star collection. Oddly, "Gold" was first published in 1930 in the Daily Dispatch (I suppose that was/is a London newspaper/tabloid) while the others in this collection were previously published in magazines and other short story collections. "Gold" feels like a throw-away work, and should have stayed that way. I've a feeling this "Tony Medawar" (connected with "Gold" wrote most, if not the entire, story, as it is so unlike Christie's body of work.
-
This was a series of short stories. I really liked them all. They were stories that were published in magazines or newspapers. I loved that they explained when and where these stories were first written.
-
Unread shelf project 2021: book 103.
My 300th book of 2021!! 🙌🏻
This was quite a surprisingly lovely set of short stories by Dame Agatha Christie. I’m a bit sad that it took me this long to pick them up!
Here’s my breakdown of the stories by star ratings:
1) The Edge: 3/5 — populated with unlikable characters, this was an interesting character study and psychological thriller-style tale.
2) The Actress: 4/5 — I love me a happy ending where the bad guys lose!
3) While the Light Lasts: 3/5 — such a tragic tale.
4) The House of Dreams: 2/5. Too mystical and weird for my taste.
5) The Lonely God: 5/5. Ugh I loved this story!
6) Manx Gold: 4.5/5. The tale of a treasure hunt between relatives — only complaint is that the riddles were never explained.
7) Within a Wall: 3.5/5. Really reminiscent of some of Louisa May Alcott’s gothic tales. Tragic but kind of unbelievable but still an enjoyable drama to read.
8) The Mystery of the Spanish Chest: 5/5. Poirot to the rescue!
9) The Harlequin Tea Set: 4/5. I’m not familiar with the character of Harley Quin so this one also felt a bit mystical and unbelievable but the drama and mystery was enjoyable! -
Nine short stories: The Edge, The Actress, While the Light Lasts, The House of Dreams, The Lonely God, Manx Gold, Within a Wall, The Mystery of the Spanish Chest (Hercule Poirot), and The Harlequin Tea Set (Harley Quin). I enjoyed the mysteries in this collection the most but the stories such as While the Light Lasts, The House of Dreams and The Lonely God, and Within a Wall that deal with love, lost or unobtainable, and personal ambition were also enjoyable. The Edge grabbed me and pulled me into this collection right off the bat with it's story of secret knowledge leading to power and tragedy. Manx Gold was the weakest story, the treasure hunt and unknown relatives of dubious integrity didn't really keep me interested. Overall an entertaining and quickly readable collection of short stories.
-
I really liked some of these stories, particularly "The House of Dreams". This story was really rather sad, not a mystery but a sort of unrequited tragic love story. John and Allegra have a connection, but Allegra is tormented by a "monster" - John recognizes this sleeping monster in her, but never stops to consider why he can recognize this Thing, and is continually haunted by his beautiful house of dreams. "The Lonely God" is a really sweet love story, I feel bad for the god though, I hope his worshippers went back to visit from time to time!
-
Like others reviewers have said, the hype surrounding Agatha Christie is most certainly appropriate. She absolutely knew how to write a story. In this series of short stories, the one which blew me away and moved me to the core was The Lonely God. I teared up at this powerful and amazing story. She cut to the heart of the human condition of loneliness and painted a beautiful enduring love story.
-
Only one of the stories, The Mystery of the Spanish Chest, had Poirot in it. All but the last one were published in the late 20s and early 30s. The final story, The Harlequin Tea Set, was the very last one published, in 1971. It was quite interesting, with more than a hint of the supernatural.
-
I really enjoyed The Actress, The Lonely God, The Edge and The Harlequin Tea Set. I was surprised how much I enjoyed these.
-
The first movement of Beethoven’s Pathetique Sonata is played with ‘that expression of grief that is infinite and sorrow that is endless and vast as the ages, but in which from end to end breathes the spirit that will not accept defeat in the solemnity of undying woe, it moves in the rhythm of the conqueror to its final doom.’
This 1997 collection of nine stories was published some years after the death of their author. Married in 1914, Christie and her first husband divorced in 1927, an action resulting from an infidelity on the part of the latter. Not surprisingly, most of these stories, which are largely from the 1920s, deal with romantic triangles and their ensuing complications.
‘The Edge’ from 1927 deals with such a love triangle, the inevitable placing before one of an unavoidable temptation and a willingness to sacrifice all for one’s true love. Both selfishness and forbearance are featured in a very insightful examination of a real moral dilemma. The resulting self-imposed sentence is a strange twist considering Christie’s general inability to ever forgive murder, no matter what extenuating circumstances may have existed.
‘The Actress’ from 1923 allows the title character to demonstrate the true strength of her thespian skills in her response to an impending act of blackmail against her.
Although set in Africa, 1924’s ‘While the Twilight Lasts’ follows a similar path as ‘The Edge’. A love triangle, a refusal by a main character to follow through on an obvious path of action, a biblical injunction and an eventual ultimate act of self sacrifice make the twists of circumstance in both stories virtually identical.
‘The House of Dreams’ from 1926 is a poignant, sad, elusive tale of love, frustrated desire, the burdens of inheritance and, above all else, insanity. It also involves a romantic triangle, the difficulties of variant financial fortunes and the willingness to sacrifice oneself for love. The passage in which Christie describes the first movement of Beethoven’s Pathetique sonata is truly impressive.
‘The Lonely God’ is a beautifully crafted love story which deals quite realistically with loneliness and the challenge of achieving true love without deception. A glimmer of what Christie would use in the characterizations developed in her Westmacott novels was apparent here early on in her writing career.
1930’s ‘Manx Gold’ recounts in a rather uninspiring way a treasure hunt left for two young lovers to outwit their nefarious relatives. Very similar to the later ‘Strange Jest’ story.
‘Within a Wall’ from 1925 is yet another story in this collection to involve a love triangle. Her representations of artistic integrity, the influence of financial pressures, the roles available to one in society and the nature of true love are all very astutely done in this tragic story of the end of a true artist’s integrity. Excellent story.
‘The Mystery of the Spanish Chest’ from 1932 is the first story in this collection with a clear-cut crime of murder. Rather than a romantic triangle giving rise to its events, this time there is more a ‘romantic square’, with a true siren of a woman spurring rash feelings and actions on the part of three different men. Quite ingenious.
The final story in the collection was written in 1971 and involves the characters of Harley Quin and Mr. Sattlethwaite, both of whom I wish Christie had used more often. Although there is again a love triangle, the main thrust is to try to prevent a murder. The semi-spectral figure of Quin works through his perceptive liaison Sattlethwaite since, as the later surmises, death or love is the overriding issue. The spectral images of the closing paragraphs are beautifully done.
All in all, an impressive collection of human spirits relatively immune to the criminal motivations which so dominate her other writings but more poignant and moving for being so. -
These were all quite good. Classic Christie and The House of Dreams is referred to several times by Lucy Worsley in her bio of Dame Agatha.
-
I'll give each story a short rating:
The Edge - 5
This story was my favourite. It has a lot of character development and self-discovery and plot twists, and an unexpected ending. It also moved quickly, and had characters reveal information without any pretense, which was great because sometimes Agatha Christie's stories drag on.
The Actress - 4
This story was clever and entertaining, but I had to read it twice to understand what had happened. I didn't think what happened was explained very well, but other people might disagree. Also, the plot of this story is set in motion by the occurrence of a coincidence which was very unlikely and unrealistic.
While The Light Lasts - 3
This story is stupid. It deals a lot with inner conflicts, which is interesting but leads to a conclusion which makes no sense. The action of a character completely contrasts everything we knew about him so far. Thankfully, this story is short.
The House Of Dreams - 5
I love this one. It's slightly too long, but the premise and the twist at the end are amazing. It's beautifully written, and made scary by all the mystery and foreboding worked into the plot.
The Lonely God - 2
This story is boring, and kind of sad. It mostly consists of awkward dialogue between two characters while the supposed protagonist simply watches. The conflict seems to have been added in at the last second, and is resolved in less than a page. This story is too long.
Manx Gold - 3.5
This isn't a real short story, but a collection of clues for a scavenger hunt, placed in the context of a story. Manx Gold was written to contain the clues of a scavenger hunt which occurred on the Isle Of Man years ago. There is a conflict, but no real plot. The characters are one-dimensional. Manx Gold read like a set of clues for a scavenger hunt, and not like a short story. It doesn't belong in this book.
Within A Wall - 4.5
I liked this story because it has a wonderful and varied group of characters, and a few paintings are described, which sound great and give the story more flavour. The premise is interesting, but I can't decide whether it's plausible or not. This story is just the right length, and it's beautifully written.
The Mystery Of The Spanish Chest - 3.5
This reads like a conventional murder-mystery. While it was clear who the murderer was for a while, it was still interesting to watch the detective interview people and slowly reveal information. There were four suspects, but I felt that two of them were really an unnecessary addition to the story. They had no motives, didn't really know any of the other characters, and seemed to be only there as space-fillers.
The Harlequin Tea Set - 4.5
This is a great story! The crime in it is clever and surprising, yet plausible. Of all the stories in the book, this one is the most well thought-out. It did contain certain elements that I thought were sort of unnecessary, and one character went into a long explanation of a family's history - but that was, at least, relevant. This story felt long, but it had to be to include all of the backstory and explaining that was necessary for a reader's understanding of the plot. -
Terrific collection of Christie's short stories, including one Poirot story (a reworked version of the Baghdad Chest mystery) and one involving the mysterious, possibly supernatural, Mr. Harley Quin. Some of these aren't mysteries, but all of them are great reading.
-
Enjoyed this book as I do most of Agatha Christie’s books. Some of short stories have appeared in other collections. But still contains s good range of stories. Especially enjoy The Harlequin Tea set story which is the reason I bought the book.
-
I liked this collection of stories, it's different from Christie's usual works, but is undeniably her style. I think my favorite was the final one (the namesake of the book) because it had an interesting surreal quality to it, and the cadence of the writing was different from the others.
-
Sadly, not at all what I expected, but some of the stories were really good.
-
Truly psychological thriller by Dame Christie. This is unlike any other mysteries of her series. Totally addictive and at times, scary too
-
This book is a bit of a weird one because I basically only bought it to make sure that I’ve finished reading all of Agatha Christie’s books. The problem is that this is one of those examples where the books were published slightly differently in the UK and the US.
This is basically just the UK short story collection While the Light Lasts, but with a couple of other extra stories that are from other books that I’ve already read. When I picked it up to get going and read through the list of stories, I was pretty sure that they sounded familiar. It turns out that I’ve already read them all, and so it’s almost a bit of a cheat to mark this one as “read”. I certainly didn’t read the whole thing from cover to cover.
But I did get to dip in and out of some of the stories that I’ve enjoyed in the past, so that was quite nice. At the same time, I wasn’t really the biggest fan of While the Light Lasts, to the point at which my favourite stories in here were the two or three that came from other collections.
There are definitely better places to start with Christie, and in fact if you read all of the UK releases then you won’t miss anything out by skipping this one. I’m not even sure if it’s still available, which might explain why it took me so long to track it down. It’s really best suited to big collectors. -
I really enjoyed these short stories because all I had ever read of Christie were Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple. There was one Hercule in the collection and one Harley Quin, whom I had heard of but never read. The rest were mysteries without her normal heroes. My favorite stories were "The Edge" and "The Little God." Both were great! There were nine stories in all.
-
My last short story collection with Poirot.
The one titled The Lonely God will haunt me forever. -
Another fab collection of short stories from Christie. I always enjoy listening to these, even though some have been completely bizarre.
The Edge
A story of jealousy and crazy dramatics. Basically, one chick is pissed because the guy she totally loved shot her down for the stunningly beautiful wild type. She doesn't understand because she and the guy were besties and it didn't make any sense. (Though, we all know it did.) By pure coincidence she discovers the wife of her best friend that she passionately loves, is having an affair. Let the fun begin!
The Actress
Bring on the blackmail! A young actress is getting put through wringer because she killed someone in self-defense and now someone is threatening to blow her secret. I kind of loved the trickiness of the characters in this one.
While the Light Lasts
I actually had already listened to this one as a stand alone before I came to it again in the book. This was one of the first non-detective Christie stories I experienced and it kind of left me thinking, "What the hell...…?" I just didn't see the point. A lady comes across her fiancé (husband? can't remember at this point) who she thought died in the war. Now it's been years and she's married to a good man, but she kind of wants her old squeeze. How to tell the new hubby? Then suddenly, something happens and the old fiancé I didn't understand what I was supposed to get from this one.
The House of Dreams
A man keeps dreaming about a white house that he can't get inside. Then he starts to see some dark creepy thing living in the house. Meanwhile, in the real world, he meets a woman that he loves to pieces, but she has a secret and because of that keeps him at a distance. Lots of symbolism, and apparently the first short story Christie ever wrote. Didn't have strong opinions either way on this one.
The Lonely God
My favorite story in the bunch. A darling love story set into action by the Lonely God on the shelf of a museum. He watches and encourages two reluctant people to find each other.
Manx Gold
Fun little race to get the gold/inheritance. The chemistry between the two main characters reminded me a lot of Tommy and Tuppence.
Within a Wall
Obviously I must not have liked this one a lot because I remember practically nothing about it. Something about an artist. I even went and read the descriptions and I can't remember how it ends at all. My mind is a total blank.
The Mystery of the Spanish Chest
I've come across this one a couple other times and reviewed it already. I like it. It's a fun Poirot short story.
The Harlequin Tea Set
I had a hard time focusing on this one. Harley Quin is not my favorite character.
