The ABC Murders Vs Murder On The Orient Express. Which one should you buy first ?

Agatha Christie is often regarded as the best author of murder mysteries till date. During her time, she has written countless masterpieces such as And Then There Were None, The Murder Of Roger Ackroyd, The ABC Murders, Murder On The Orient Express, Peril At End House, etc.

On seeing 2 great murder mystery novels, a reader often gets confused about which one to buy and read first. Should it be this one or that one ? Thoughts like these linger in the reader's mind and trouble him for hours.

But we are here to help you guys. And that's why, in this article, will take a look at 2 great murder mysteries; Murder On The Orient Express and The ABC Murders and we will help you determine which one is more suitable for you and should be bought first.

So, without any further ado...

LETS GET STARTED !

Before we begin our comparison, let us have a basic introduction of each book:

1) The ABC Murders :

'LET US SEE, MR. CLEVER POIROT, JUST HOW CLEVER YOU CAN BE...'

Murder is a very simple crime. But at the hands of a maniac, a serial killer, it becomes a very complicated business.

With the whole country in a state of panic, the killer is growing more confident with each successive execution, Mrs. Ascher in Andover, Betty Bernard in Bexhill, Sir Carmichael Clarke is Churston...

But laying a trail of deliberate clues to taunt the proud Hercule Poirot might just be his first mistake.

2) Murder On The Orient Express :

'THE MURDERER IS WITH US - ON THE TRAIN NOW...'

Just after midnight, the famous Orient Express is stopped in its tracks by a snowdrift. A passenger lies dead in his compartment, stabbed a dozen times, his door locked from the inside

Isolated by the storm and with a killer in their midst, detective Hercule Poirot must identify the prime suspects from a scornful and impatient array of passengers- before the murderer decides to strike again...

Arguments in favor of ABC murders:

One of the major problems which I have with some of the books written by Agatha Christie is that the story seems to get a bit boring around the middle, because the only thing happening throughout the book is one interview after the other. While the interviews do drop some new twists and turns to the mystery, but still... it gets a little boring. 

But that's not the case with ABC murders... coz this book is not a slow one like other Christie classics, rather, this is a fast paced mystery novel with one event quickly succeeding the other, one challenge after the other, one threat after other, one murder after the other and so on. Therefore, one major advantage which this book definitely has over the other book titled Murder On The Orient Express is its fast paced story.

Another advantage of this book is its uniqueness. This book is known for being very differently written by Agatha Christie as compared to her other books. In most of the her Hercule Poirot books, the basic blueprint of the plot is this:

" murder takes place, Poirot searches for clues and motives, Poirot discovers clues which make the case more and more confusing, Poirot sits and uses his gray cells, Poirot solves the case." 

But that's not the case in this one. This book is a "one on one showdown", a battle for supremacy between Poirot and the murderer,  With the murderer openly challenging Poirot and Poirot doing his best to determine with identity of the murderer with absolutely no clues in his hands , the plot of this book couldn't be anymore unique !

Arguments in favor of Murder On The Orient Express :

Often regarded regarded as one of the 3 best books written by Agatha Christie (the other 2 are "And Then There Were None" and "The Murder Of Roger Ackroyd"), this book belongs to the list of Top 3 most sold books of Agatha Christie. This book is known for its setting (i.e. the place where the murder takes place), its unique set of characters , and the plot around which the story revolves. The book has the classic blueprint like every other book which involves a murder taking place, Poirot discovering clues, Poirot siting back and thinking and Poirot coming up with a solution. 

But despite this, the book has managed to be unique in its own way with the passengers of the Orient Express trapped in a snow storm inside a train with a murderer in their midst, Poirot without any help from the outside world, completely dependent on the clues obtained from within the train and without any means to verify the historical background of the suspects, believe me, this book surely proves why it deserves to be in top 3 most sold books written by Agatha Christie.

Another feature which gives this a book an advantage over the other one is its unique ending. I mentioned this in my book review for this book also. The ending, i.e. the solution to the plot and the identity of the culprit is so unexpected that when I read this book for the first time, I was absolutely blown away after reading the complete book.

Now, I know that many readers will say that The ABC Murders had a better ending, but the thing is... each one of us has different tastes and I just seem to like the ending of Murder On The Orient Express better than the ending of "The ABC Murders"

Now that we have stated all the possible arguments regarding the 2 books, lets see if we can come to a conclusion about which book is better.

Surely, the figures also give us a hint about which book is liked more by majority of the reader. The fact that "Murder On The Orient Express" is sold more than "The ABC Murders" clearly gives us an indication that the former is liked more by the readers. But that does not establish anything regarding the fact whether you should like the former or the latter.

In short we can say this:

Read The ABC Murders if you want the following elements to be present in the story;

• Fast paced story.
• One on One battle between the detective and the murderer.
• The sense of urgency, the feeling that something must be done in order to catch the madman before another murder takes place.

Read Murder On The Orient Express if you want the following elements to be present in a story:

• A book full of interviews and new clues getting revealed at regular intervals.
• A large set of characters playing and all of them playing an important role in the story.
• A mind blowing end to the mystery

So there you go, if you wanna only one of the books mentioned in this article, then read the above points and select the book which you like the most. Personally, I just like The ABC Murders more than Murder On The Orient Express because I am a little impatient and I find it a little boring to go through loads and loads of interviews for finding a single clue.

If you have read both the books then I have a question for you...

Which one did you like more ?

Do tell me in the comments section ! 

If you liked this article and wanna read more articles similar to this one, then here are some other articles written by me:

The ABC Murders-Book Review

Murder On The Orient Express-Book Review

And Then There Were None-Book Review

So this was all for this article. Thanks a lot for spending your precious time and reading this article.

Well then...

Until next time...

HAPPY READING !