Book Review: The Christie Affair (arc)

The Christie Affair (arc) (2022) by

Fiction | Historical Fiction | Mystery

Disclaimer: In every review that I complete, I try my best to avoid spoilers of any kind and include spoiler warnings when necessary.

About the book (from Goodreads)

Nina de Gramont's The Christie Affair is a beguiling novel of star-crossed lovers, heartbreak, revenge, and murder—and a brilliant re-imagination of one of the most talked-about unsolved mysteries of the twentieth century.

Every story has its secrets.

Every mystery has its motives.

“A long time ago, in another country, I nearly killed a woman. It’s a particular feeling, the urge to murder. It takes over your body so completely, it’s like a divine force, grabbing hold of your will, your limbs, your psyche. There’s a joy to it. In retrospect, it’s frightening, but I daresay in the moment it feels sweet. The way justice feels sweet.”

The greatest mystery wasn’t Agatha Christie’s disappearance in those eleven infamous days, it’s what she discovered.

London, 1925: In a world of townhomes and tennis matches, socialites and shooting parties, Miss Nan O’Dea became Archie Christie’s mistress, luring him away from his devoted and well-known wife, Agatha Christie.

The question is, why? Why destroy another woman’s marriage, why hatch a plot years in the making, and why murder? How was Nan O’Dea so intricately tied to those eleven mysterious days that Agatha Christie went missing?

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Note: Thank you to Netgalley & the publishers for allowing me access to this arc! Please note that all opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

My Review

As soon as I received my copy of The Christie Affair, I pushed it to the very top of my list so that I could have a review completed before its release date next week.

And let me tell you, I am beyond disappointed.

The Christie Affair -primarily the story based on the events of Agatha Christie's mysterious disappearance for eleven days in 1926- had the potential to be great, but unfortunately, fell flat.

"It's a particular feeling, the urge to murder."

The Good Things

Told from the perspective of Nan Christie -Archie Christie's second wife- each of the characters she encounters is intriguing and well-written. The author does a fantastic job allowing for Nan to offer a character in a way that she sees them, alongside how others portray them.

1. The cover is absolutely gorgeous. It is eye-catching and fitting for the story.

2. There are a lot of quotable lines, which I suppose is a reflection of the author's writing skills.

3. The last 30% of the book is a much better story than the first 70%.

"Anyone who says I have no regrets is either a psychopath or a liar."

The Bad Things

1. This is a big one. Because the story is told from Nan's point of view, there are parts of the story that seem extremely far-fetched. Yes, she admits on several occasions that she wasn't actually there for some of the events that took place and that her account is merely guesswork, but doing so takes away from the story significantly. Also, how are we supposed to believe that what happened to Agatha is entirely true. It is told from the perspective of her husband's mistress. Plus, from what we are led to understand right off the bat, Nan didn't actually know Agatha that well. (I'm aware this is fiction, but it still needs to be believable).

2. There are a lot of plot-holes and certain events that don't entirely make sense. I don't want to delve too far into those out of fear of spoiling things.

3. About 70% of the entire story was either boring, or full of useless information, including a lot of Nan's background that had little to do with the main story. In my opinion, took away from the point of the story: to tell where Agatha really was when she disappeared.

The main reason I am giving this two stars is that I honestly just did not enjoy reading this book. Maybe I had too high of hopes for it, or perhaps I just expected a different kind of story, or maybe, just maybe, the book is unnecessarily overhyped.

My Final Rating:

☆☆ (Goodreads)

☆☆ (Blog)

☆☆ (Amazon - will post as soon as the book is released)

Release Date: February 1, 2022. Pre-order this from Amazon by clicking here!

If you have access to this ARC, please feel free to leave comments concerning how you liked -or didn't like, no judgment here- it! If you don't have access, let me know if this is on your tbr! I would love to hear your thoughts!