The Mysterious Mr Quin

Agatha Mary Clarissa Miller was born on the 15th September 1890 in Torquay, Devon.

She was primarily home schooled and developed an early passion for both reading and music.

During the horrors of World War I she served as a nurse and later a pharmacy assistant. These experiences, especially the deep and technical knowledge of poisons, became a later trademark of her detective stories

In 1920 she debuted in the literary world with ‘The Mysterious Affair at Styles’ and with it an introduction to the detective Hercule Poirot, the fastidious Belgian who would appear in 33 of her novels.

In 1926, Christie published ‘The Murder of Roger Ackroyd’, a masterpiece of the "unreliable narrator" trope. That same year, following the death of her mother and the infidelity of her first husband, Archie Christie, she famously disappeared for 11 days. The nationwide manhunt ended when she was found at a hotel in Harrogate, though she never publicly explained the episode.

In 1930, she introduced her second most famous sleuth, Miss Jane Marple, the sharp-eyed under-estimated spinster in ‘The Murder at the Vicarage’.

That same year, Agatha married archaeologist Sir Max Mallowan. This marriage led to frequent travels to the Middle East, providing authentic backdrops for classics like such as ‘Murder on the Orient Express’ and ‘Death on the Nile’.

As well as novels her play ‘The Mousetrap’ opened in London’s West End in 1952 and holds the record for the longest-running play in history. Under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott, she wrote six successful romance novels exploring more emotional and psychological themes.

In 1971, she was appointed a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) for her contributions to literature.

Agatha Christie died peacefully on the 12th January 1976 at Winterbrook, near Wallingford, Oxfordshire. She was 85.

She left behind a legacy of 66 detective novels and 14 short story collections which included her final published works, written in the 1940s, but released after her death and that detailed the final journeys of both Poirot and Marple.

She remains the best-selling novelist of all time with billions of books sold. That total is still added to every year.