Agatha Christie - While the Light Lasts

Title: While the Light Lasts

Author: Agatha Christie

Type: Fiction

Page Count/Review Word Count: 213

Rating: 8/10

Agatha Christie – While the Light Lasts

While the Light Lasts is an excellent collection of some of Agatha Christie’s finest short stories, all of which were previously published between 1923 and 1932, during one of Christie’s most prolific and commercially successful periods. Each of these stories is worth reading on literary merit alone, but some are more interesting than others.

Manx Gold, in particular, stands out as one of Christie’s more interesting pieces, written on commission for the Isle of Man. The story contains coded references to the locations of four snuffboxes that were actually hidden on the island, each of which contained a voucher for £100 – quite a lot of money at the time, and hardly to be sneezed at today.

Crossovers like these are rare for even the most inventive of writers, but it’s unusual for Christie to have taken on such an ambitious undertaking. But while Manx Gold might be interesting because of its real-life crossover, the rest of the stories should not be overlooked – Christie is a fantastic writer, and this collection is a subtle reminder of why they call her the Queen of Crime. Excellent work, from the pen of a legendary great.