When Miss Marple comes up from the countryside for a holiday in London, she finds what she's looking for at Bertram's Hotel: traditional decor, impeccable service and an unmistakeable atmosphere of danger behind the highly polished veneer.

The brilliant Belgian detective Hercule Poirot becomes involved in an unusual case after a member of an archaeological expedition is murdered at an ancient site in the Iraqi desert.

The villagers of Chipping Cleghorn are agog with curiosity over an advertisement in the local gazette which reads: A murder is announced and will take place on Friday October 29th, at Little Paddocks at 6.30pm. Is it a hoax? As the time approaches a crowd gathers, and then the lights go out. Miss Marple investigates.

In this novelisation of a playscript, the formula for a powerful explosive is stolen. Locking his guests in the library, Sir Claud switches off the lights to let the thief replace it, no questions asked. When the lights come on, Sir Claud is dead and Hercule Poirot must act quickly to prevent a global catastrophe. (Adapted by Charles Osborne).

Two recently-rediscovered Hercule Poirot short stories by Agatha Christie, read by David Suchet. In 2004, a remarkable archive was unearthed at Agatha Christie's family home, Greenway - 73 of her private notebooks, filled with pencilled jottings and ideas. Hidden within this literary treasure trove were two rare, never-before-published short storie...

There's Rosemary, that's for remembrance.' Published in 1945, Sparkling Cyanide is all about remembrance. It begins with six characters recalling the horrific death of Rosemary Barton, a beautiful but shallow young heiress poisoned by a cyanide-spiked glass of champagne whilst celebrating her birthday at a smart London restaurant. Rosemary haunts a...

A BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation starring June Whitfield as Miss Marple, the sharp-witted spinster sleuth. In the sleepy little English country village of St Mary Mead, all is not as it seems. Under a seemingly peaceful exterior lurks intrigue, guilt, deception - and murder. Colonel Protheroe, local magistrate and overbearing landowner, is the...

Everyone expected Isabella Charteris, beautiful, sheltered and aristocratic, to marry her cousin Rupert when he came back from the War. It would have been such a suitable marriage. How strange then that John Gabriel, an ambitious and ruthless war hero, should appear in her life. For Isabella, the price of love would mean abandoning her dreams of ho...

Over the three decades since her death on 12 January 1976, many of Agatha Christie's readers and reviewers have maintained that her most compelling book is probably still her least well-known. Her candid Autobiography, written mainly in the 1960s, modestly ignores the fact that Agatha had become the best-selling novelist in history and concentrates...

A fascinating collection of archive radio programmes focusing on the life and work of crime fiction's grande dame and featuring Agatha Christie in her own words. Dame Agatha Christie published 66 detective novels and 14 short story collections in her lifetime, but to the public she remained an enigmatic figure. This quartet of BBC radio programm...

It is Christmas Eve. The Lee family reunion is shattered by a deafening crash of furniture. Upstairs, the tyrannical Simeon Lee lies dead in a pool of blood, his throat slashed. But when Hercule Poirot, who is staying in the village with a friend for Christmas, offers to assist, he finds an atmosphere of mutual suspicion. It seems everyone had thei...

Here are four stories by the most popular mystery writer of all time; stories told by Miss Marple and her friends and solved by that elderly white-haired lady with the faded blue eyes and quiet nature. They are read by Joan Hickson, who played Miss Marple in the television series based on the works of Agatha Christie. In The Thumbmark of St Peter M...

Agatha Christie's shocking courtroom drama, read on audio by her grandson, Mathew Prichard. When wealthy spinster Emily French is found murdered, suspicion falls to Leonard Vole, the man to whom she hastily bequeathed her riches before she died. Leonard assures the investigators that his wife, Romaine Heilger, can provide them with an alibi. Howeve...

On a French golf course, a millionaire is found stabbed in the back... An urgent cry for help brings Poirot to France. But why is the dead man wearing his son's overcoat? And who was the impassioned love-letter in the pocket for? Before Poirot can answer these questions, the case is turned upside down by the discovery of a second, identically murde...

Agatha Christie's first ever murder mystery. After the Great War, life can never be the same again. Wounds need healing, and the horror of violent death banished into memory. Captain Arthur Hastings is invited to the rolling country estate of Styles to recuperate from injuries sustained at the Front. It is the last place he expects to encounter mur...

Ten strangers, apparently with little in common, are lured to an island mansion off the coast of Devon by the mysterious U.N.Owen. Over dinner, a record begins to play, and the voice of an unseen host accuses each person of hiding a guilty secret. That evening, former reckless driver Tony Marston is found murdered by a deadly dose of cyanide. The t...

In utter disbelief, Miss Marple read the letter addressed to her from the recently deceased Mr Rafiel, an acquaintance she had met briefly on her travels. Recognising in Miss Marple a natural flair for justice, Mr Rafiel had left instructions for her to investigate a crime after his death. The only problem was, he had failed to tell her who was inv...

"Anyone who murdered Colonel Protheroe," declared the parson, brandishing a carving knife above a joint of roast beef, "would be doing the world at large a service!" It was a careless remark for a man of the cloth. And one which was to come back and haunt the clergyman just a few hours later. From seven potential murderers, Miss Marple must seek ou...

A handful of grain is found in the pocket of a murdered businessman.Rex Fortescue, king of a financial empire, was sipping tea in his 'counting house' when he suffered an agonising and sudden death. On later inspection, the pockets of the deceased were found to contain traces of cereals. Yet, it was the incident in the parlour which confirmed Jane...

As Jane Marple sat basking in the Caribbean sunshine, she felt mildly discontented with life. True, the warmth eased her rheumatism, but here in paradise, nothing ever happened. Eventually, her interest was aroused by an old soldier's yarn about a strange coincidence. Infuriatingly, just as he was about to show her an astonishing photograph, the Ma...

For an instant the two trains ran together, side by side. In that frozen moment, Elspeth witnessed a murder. Helplessly, she stared out of her carriage window as a man remorselessly tightened his grip around a woman's throat. The body crumpled. Then the other train drew away. But who, apart from Miss Marple, would take her story seriously? After al...