The Sittaford Mystery - Book Review

I am reading through the novels of Agatha Christie in the order in which they were written and writing a review on each one.

The Sittaford Mystery. 


1931  



Description

In a remote house in the middle of Dartmoor, six shadowy figures huddle around a small round table foe a seance.

Tension rises as the spirits spell out a chilling message:
Is this black magic or simply a macabre joke? 

The only way to be certain is to locate Captain Trevelyan. 
Unfortunately, his home is six miles away and, with snow drifts blocking the roads, someone will have to make the journey on foot...

         'Captain Trevelyan...dead...murder'

My Thoughts

This is the 14th book by Agatha Christie and the First to be what I would describe as a stand alone murder mystery.  

It features none of Miss Christie's previous detectives or sleuths and none of the characters in this book are found in any of the later books she wrote.
This story is based in the countryside and in the depth of winter making travelling difficult and that is essential to the whole book.

There are a small cast of neighbours but of course our writer is not confined to just these few to weave her story but also takes us far away to see that others may have had some influence in it all.


I really enjoyed this story and do believe that this title is the better title for the book than the American one of "Murder at Hazelmoor".    Yes the story is of a murder but definitely in this Christie novel it is the mystery that we need to solve.



Of course a detective/policeman is needed to solve the case but even that is not exactly as it seems at first and in my eyes this is another good example of the Christie use of Red Herrings.
A good read and a simple solution but just not simple until explained.

 Here is a link to a list of her novels on Amazon
Books by Agatha Christie

Pondering the Psalms - Psalm 136

Each Sunday I choose a Psalm and write down some brief thoughts on it.


Today I'm looking at Psalm 136 

This Psalm falls into 5 parts:



V. 1-3
God


V. 4-9
Creation


V. 10-22
Redemption


V. 23-25
Love


V. 26
Hope

This Psalm starts and ends with two almost identical verses - verse 1 and verse 26

However they are each placed specifically at those important points.

We Start with God's Goodness

God.
He is the God of gods and the Lord of lords.
 He is Good, He is Merciful and He is Love and His goodness, mercy and love will never end.
 How could we not be thankful?

Creation.
He is full of wonder and creative power.
All that is on, above and around the earth was made by Him.


Redemption.
He provided our Salvation right from the start.
Our lives should be a witness to that.


Love.
He is the one who always sees, cares, and acts on behalf of His people.


Hope.
Even though we have not seen Heaven or can properly understand Heaven we believe in God so we believe in Heaven because we know His love is not going to end.

The Psalm is a portrait of our lives with Him.

 How He is good to us and draws us 

through our knowledge of 

His Greatness, Salvation and Love 

to the culmination of a 
Home 
perfectly prepared for us by Him.

We end with Heaven.

This is a Psalm which some might say is simply repetitive.

But

this is really a Psalm of recognition on our part of how worthy God is to be praised 
over and over again.

This is a Psalm which uses the history of the world to highlight the Love of God
to His people

and

to lead us to 

the Eternal Hope we have in Heaven - our home with Him! 

A Simple Little Heart Recycle

Preparations coming up to Christmas and having family here over Christmas doesn't leave a lot of time to declutter or tackle any jobs I might have on my list but even getting a little thing done is helpful.

As I was sorting out some of the many things that had accumulated around my desk (which I have been gradually working on for ages) I came across two hearts.

They were from our niece Joanne's Wedding over 2 years ago and had been our place names at the wedding reception.

I like black and white and was sure that I could find some way of using them on a project so had kept them, but up to now I had not thought of how to use them.


Then now after two years I see them and suddenly have an idea.



If you have read previous blog posts of mine about my study and about things I love then you will know that I really do love hearts and have quite a few hearts around the study and the house.


In fact on the bathroom door and the back toilet door I have hearts to show what the room is

I had got these on ebay and loved them so I also later contacted the lady selling them to see if she had ones with study and office on them but she didn't.


Well I know that these hearts are not the same but I just thought I would use them anyway and all I needed was some blu tac and a pair of scissors.


I snipped off the long parts of the black ribbon just leaving the little bows on each heart, then stuck them to the doors with some blu tac.

I didn't add the words study or office because I would not be able to match the special calligraphy already on them but the names would do just fine as the study is mine and the office is Fred's.

Heart to Heart - table to door - a simple recycle.

How simple a recycle was that?


Can you find something that could be as simple a project as this?

Well now to look at the final results of work for this.

Very easy and took little time and of course I like the end result so more like FUNWORK than HOUSEWORK

How We Personalized Christmas - A Dose of Encouragement

In the past we have often given someone a personalised present at Christmas or we have got personalised tree decorations for our kids

BUT  this year

we personalised Christmas quite a bit.

To start with it was our grandson Matthew's first Christmas and although he didn't know what was going on ( not even 8 weeks old by Christmas) we were all thinking about him and we started off by receiving gifts from others mentioning


"Baby's First Christmas"


Then we were at it ourselves because I bought a star tree decoration handmade about Matthew for our tree and then got one identical for Daniel & Suzie's tree.

But Fred was the one who thought of the idea that included everyone.


Now I'm the one who loves mugs and I always find myself glancing over the array of mugs in any place I see them just in case I will see a nice one (should be a bargain of course) or see one that makes me think of someone in particular and I know it will be a nice gift for them.


But Fred was the one who had the idea about the personalized mugs!


So he designed them for each of the family





The mugs for the proud grandparents.






The mugs for the proud aunt and uncle.






The mugs for the proud parents.

Then a mug for each of my 4 Black Boys.



And that is how we personalised Christmas this year.


So often we go through Christmas time in a blur of shopping, cooking, giving gifts, visiting and eating together but do we make sure that the time is really personalised?

We can personalise Christmas time in two ways and neither of them has anything to do with our names on mugs or anywhere else.

We can personalise Christmas Time in 2 ways.

We can personalise it by putting our mark on Christmas.

Yes we need time to shop for gifts and food, cook for the family and friends, give and receive gifts, visit and have meals together but we can also make time to engage with others on a good one to one basis and not just the hurried "Merry Christmas" and "hug".

We can think about little things that will make the time a happier memory for others or a time when they know someone cared enough to talk and listen to them and share a laugh or two.

I can think of a great example that happens each year in the Coffee Shop that our son Daniel manages in Belfast.  On Christmas Day anyone and everyone who may be on their own over Christmas are invited to come to Common Grounds and share in a Freshly Cooked full Christmas Dinner.

Volunteers flock to help and others are eager to donate food or money to provide a special meal and afternoon for anyone who drops in.
This year over 110 people were served and not only they, but also the volunteers were blessed in their time together.



We can personalise it by putting Christ's mark on Christmas.

Yes again we need to do all the practical things and a lot of what is involved now at Christmas time is centred around things rather than the person who is the reason we celebrate Christmas.

We need to make Jesus the Centre of Christmas and the Reason for Christmas.

One thing I insist on each year is that the Christmas cards we send out will always be focusing on Jesus and not referring to Christmas as a season.

  

Here are a few of my favourites  

And one we sent the kids in our Sunday School - deliberately picked to remind the children of the puppet show we had in church that year on the nativity and the fun time they had with the camel puppet.

Even this year when we sent out fewer cards and then sent an email greeting to link to a family letter on this blog we still wanted to express our thankfulness to God for sending the Saviour of the world and chose this picture for our Christmas greeting, keeping Christ at the centre.

We often hear things like:

“if you had been the only person on earth Jesus would have still died for you”

But we are not the only ones so we have a responsibility to put Christ's mark on each Christmas we celebrate here on earth to share Jesus with others and not remove Him from it.

We need to remember "Our mark & His mark".

I generally like to buy my Christmas Cards really early (as in the January sales!) so I am looking again now for a card with a fully Jesus centred theme to make sure I personalise Christmas for Christ.

I Wish People Would ..... - Coffee & Conversation

If you are a regular reader here or have stopped by my blog a few times then you may well know how much I Love Coffee & Chocolate.

Well at the moment I'm trying to cut down on the chocolate but ....  well not so much on the coffee.

I enjoy a large mug of coffee to sit and sip on when I'm checking my emails and sorting my ToDo lists in the morning & you also probably know how much I Love Lists and depend on them.

I do a lot of reading which is another Coffee Break Time and a lot of thinking so I thought I might do a new series on 

where I just talk a little about what is on my mind.

Today I'm starting with some things that  "I Wish"  about people.

I often WISH that I could recognise how all the people I meet are feeling so that I can understand them better.

So I PRAY that God will help me to understand people better and that He will help me do all those things I have mentioned in my little rant above.

Do you wish this about people? 

Do you pray this about yourself? 

Christmas Letter from the Blacks 2015

2015 has been one of those years that has gone so quickly,

 I felt like I never got caught up with myself.

The biggest event in our family this year was the birth of our first grandchild Matthew 

born to Daniel and Suzie 

on Monday 2nd November.  

Jonathan has continued to Pastor the church in Leeds while finishing off his Phd - well just the very last bit to go now.  He has also been around various churches teaching on different aspects of Theology
He has been over to visit us a few times this year but we believe we were not the real attraction for the last two visits!

Daniel & Suzie had a very busy year with Suzie being pregnant and little Matthew being born in November.  Unfortunately Fred was away on business when Matthew decided to arrive but that just meant that I got to cuddle Matthew before Fred did.

Daniel is still busy managing Common Grounds Coffee Shop near the university in Belfast and won the Northern Ireland Barista of the Year Championship in September.

Suzie was enjoying teaching P1 but was happy when it came time to go off on her maternity leave and we are not sure how happy she will be to return to teaching because she is so happy being at home with Matthew right now.

Linda is still in South Korea but has moved to a different area, Wongju in February to teach English at a university now.  It means we have new names to remember of friends that she has now made but she is still keeping in touch with her other Korean friends in Gangneung too.

She was able to come stay for a few weeks in August after having one of her best friends visit her in Korea.  Of course when she comes, she always brings some fun presents and this trip meant a selfie stick for Fred and of course he had to try it out straight away.

She is sad because she hasn't met her nephew yet except on facetime, so she has booked to fly over for the whole month of February and we are all looking forward to that.



Fred is doing the consultancy work that he moved into with Dupont during 2014.  This means he is travelling a lot to places like Saudi, Morocco, Germany, Switzerland, Ireland, England, Finland, Australia and I've probably forgotten some others.
When he is here he is still leading worship and helping on the leadership of our church.

The Four Black Boys

This year I finished a Tesol course at Belfast Bible College along with a friend from our church and in September we started up weekly English Classes in the church.   There are about 35 people (mostly from Poland) who are regularly coming to learn English.  We did 10 weeks of classes before Christmas and we hope to have another 20 weeks before next summer so that takes a lot of time in preparation each week to teach a two hour class and I am back writing Lesson Plans again after all these years since teaching Maths.
I'm also continuing with the Sunday School Curriculum for our church and helping in other ways there too.

I have been busy with this blog that I started in 2012 but really got wholeheartedly into at the start of 2014 and enjoy the writing and making the graphics for it.  Quite often when we are out somewhere Fred will say "I suppose you want a picture for the blog?", or when we see something or talk about something someone will say "I can see a blog post coming out of that" and they are mostly right.


Fred & I did not get away on a nice long holiday this year (because he has been so busy with work) just two days in Ballycastle and the Dark Hedges but we thoroughly enjoyed that little weekend break for my birthday.

We also drove around various places in Southern Ireland for almost two weeks but that was not a holiday it was for Fred's work and I went along to make sure he stayed awake as he had to drive so many miles each evening from one place to another.
We did manage to have a few laughs along the way some of which you can read about in 10 Things that made me Laugh in Ireland


To finish up I would just like to give thanks to God for the fact that He has continued to be with us all in all our different locations and has guided each of us through our various experiences of this year.

Love to all

Sandra  &  the rest of the Black family