The Secret Adversary By Agatha Christie

ISBN: 0007265158

First Published 1922

I started this book in a slightly worried frame of mind. This is the first Tommy and Tuppence adventure, and having seen a very dodgy TV adaptation, I have steered clear of the books. 

The story starts on the Lusitania, where a package of papers is handed to Jane Finn, an American on her way to Paris to support the war effort. She is given instructions to deliver the papers to the authorities on London.

The narrative then switches to London where Tommy & Tuppence, friends since childhood, meet and are discussing the difficulties of finding work now the war is over. They decide to form the Young Adventurers, offering detective services and quickly become involved in the hunt for Jane Finn, who is now missing along with the package.

The prologue, laying out how Jane Finn came to be in possession of the papers was a great piece of writing. The horror of the ship listing and slowly sinking was very vivid. Then I came to the chapter introducing Tommy and Tuppence, which felt like a bad cartoon. It was littered with "I say old bean" and other sayings, which although popular at the time, now feel like they have come from a bad imitation of a Wodehouse story. Despite this, I pressed on, and I was so glad that I did. That one rogue and slightly forced chapter gave way to a sinister plot to lead a coup against the British government, headed up by the mysterious and dangerous Mr Brown

The slightly dated feel of the early chapters is soon forgotten as Tommy overhears a group of terrorists from different organisations supporting each other in a bid to destabilise the country. The parallels to our own unstable world community were not lost on me, and made me wonder whether anything really changes. 

The rest of the book races by as Tommy and Tuppence hunt down Jane Finn and the papers, whilst trying to understand how Mr Brown is always one step ahead. 

I did enjoy this book, but I felt slight short changed since it wasn't a classic whodunnit, and thats what I expect when I sit down with a Christie.