I liked it. A lot. It was a surprise to me, because I remembered reading it many years ago, and the two things I remembered about it were the title and the fact that I found it quite boring, thinking nothing was happening until the second half of the book. Now I understand that I simply could not understand the characters. The first half of the book is all for us to get to know the characters, most of all the Boynton family. The old mother is a horrible tyrant, a "dompteuse" (which was taken for the italian title La Domatrice), a cruel woman who likes to have power over people. She has her family under her control. Her daughter Ginevra, the youngest of the family, who is losing her mind to escape her reality; stepdaughter Carol and stepsons Raymond and Lennox, who are all under her power. She doesn't let them live, but now that they're locked in their house anymore because she wanted to make a trip, they find a world they want to be a part of. Raymond met on the train Miss Sarah King and felt attracted to her, fell in love and because of that he's finding his life now more terrible than ever. The older brother Lennox is completely apathic, nothing seems to touch him anymore, he seems to have lost any will for life. His wife Nadine is the only one the old woman could not break, but all her attempts to change their life, to wake Lennox up are in vain. Dr Théodore Gérard is also interested in the family, and quite touched by the character of Jinny, Ginevra's nickname. I guess the first time I read this I was too young to understand this family. Lennox's apathy, Raymond and Carol shaking in fear in front of their stepmother, despite none of them is a child anymore... It all seemed strange and stupid, maybe, I don't know. What I know is that now that I understand it all, understand why they acted as they did, now it all seems interesting and I like it. Not for the solution of the mystery itself, because frankly Agatha couldn't fool me here as she once did. After reading so many books and watching so, so many crime movies and series, this one was really too easy.
Still, in a book like this that was not so important.
Half way through the book the old woman is found dead, and it would appear that her heart gave out after the hot weather and the fatigue of that trip in Petra. It would end there if it wasn't for the strange circumstance that Dr Gérard declares to the police that a certain quantity of a drug is missing from his stock. Because of this Colonel Carbury talks about the case to his guest Hercule Poirot; no doubt Poirot gets interested and promises he'll find out the truth in a day, simply by talking to the people involved. It's a strange situation because all the characters are defensive or looking guilty because each one of them suspects a dear one of the murder and wants to cover for them. Sarah is afraid for Raymond, he suspects his sister Carol who in turn suspects him, and so on for the others too. Sarah had been so angry and disgusted of the old woman, but looking at her more closely had also found her pathetic. When Sarah talked to her and Mrs Boynton said "I never forget anything, not a fact, not a face, not a name" I was not fooled for a second, I knew she wasn't talking to Sarah, it was obvious. The only way it would make sense.
I also like the ending very much, set five years later, when we find that Lennox and Nadine live happily together with their children, Carol has married old time friend of Nadine Jefferson Cope, Raymond has married Sarah and is now a writer, and Jinny is an actress, probably in a relationship with Dr Gérard who always supported her and believed in her. It's not clear what kind of relationship they have, only that she calls him "dear Théodore", which is very different from, for example, "my dear dr. Gérard", right?, so I think they're probably a couple now. They are together to watch Jinny's play and afterwards they meet Poirot, congratulating her on her performance, and Sarah updates him on their situation and thanks him for making it possible, by clearing the positions of all the innocents involved. :-)
I also liked that two of Christie's previous books are mentioned, by Miss Pierce who knows Poirot because she has read of that "the A.B.C. murders" case, and Sarah King, that suspecting Raymond she asks Poirot to back off, reminding him of when he accepted the official report on the Orient-Express case :-)
Great book, I loved it.
Ita: La domatrice
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