And Then There Were None By Agatha - Christie

When the book was published, readers were furious. Critics called it "unfair." Christie herself admitted in her autobiography that the technical challenge of solving the murders was so difficult she had to hide the solution in plain sight—and even then, most people missed it.

Christie does something revolutionary here. She removes the "safe" character. In a normal mystery, you trust the narrator or the detective. Here, everyone is a liar. Everyone has blood on their hands. The paranoia is so thick you can cut it with a knife. I will not ruin the ending for you, but I will tell you this: even for a woman who wrote The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (which has one of the most famous twist endings in history), Christie outdid herself.

Upon arrival, a gramophone record accuses each guest of murder. Not the kind you go to jail for—the kind you got away with. A negligent doctor. A governess who looked the other way. A soldier who sent a man to his death out of jealousy. and then there were none by agatha christie

Then the nursery rhyme on the wall begins to come true. Ten little soldier boys went out to dine; One choked his little self and then there were nine. The plot device is terrifyingly simple: the guests begin dying one by one, exactly as the rhyme predicts. First, one chokes on poison. The next morning, another is found dead in his bed. As the storm cuts the island off from the mainland, the survivors realize the killer is not outside in the dark— the killer is one of them.

5/5 soldier boys.

Here is why, nearly a century later, And Then There Were None remains the ultimate locked-room puzzle. Most Christie novels feature a brilliant detective—the meticulous Hercule Poirot or the nosy Miss Marple. And Then There Were None has neither.

Their host, the enigmatic U.N. Owen (sounding suspiciously like "Unknown"), is absent. When the book was published, readers were furious

It is the best-selling crime novel of all time (over 100 million copies sold). It is the book that made the Queen of Crime terrified of her own plot. And it is arguably the only mystery in history where the ending leaves you just as unsettled as the murders themselves.