The Thirteen Problems - 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 Thirteen Problems 

1932

Description

The Tuesday Night Club is a venue where locals challenge Miss Marple to solve recent crimes…

One Tuesday evening a group gathers at Miss Marple’s house and the conversation turns to unsolved crimes…

The case of the disappearing bloodstains; the thief who committed his crime twice over; the message on the death-bed of a poisoned man which read ‘heap of fish’; the strange case of the invisible will; a spiritualist who warned that ‘Blue Geranium’ meant death…

My Thoughts

This is the 16th book by Agatha Christie and the 2nd Miss Marple Mystery.

It is a book of short stories with the following titles:

The Tuesday Night Club

The Idol House of Astarte

Ingots of Gold

The Bloodstained Pavement

Motive v Opportunity

The Thumb Mark of St. Peter

The Blue Geranium

The Companion

The Four Suspects

A Christmas Tragedy

The Herb of Death

The Affair at the Bungalow

Death by Drowning

The first story sets the scene for the rest - there are a certain group of people gathered together in a relaxed atmosphere who each present a mystery and the others are to suggest the solution to this mystery.  

Miss Marple's nephew features here along with some others who may or may not appear in further books.

Miss Marple may seem like the one who would have the least experience of the "big bad world" but she is in fact the one who has seen many things in her small village and thus is the one who can provide the solutions.

Some of the short stories here have actually later been used as the ideas for other Christie stories.

As much as I enjoy a full story where the reader has to read carefully and uncover all the clues hidden within to solve the crime at times I really do enjoy a group of short stories like this to read.  Somewhat like enjoying a cryptic crossword puzzle because each correct answer written into the puzzle brings a sense of satisfaction itself.

Or perhaps these short stories are just a series of quick fixes for us mystery lovers.

A good read with such a varied group of stories.

Also a good start for someone to get introduced to the books of Agatha Christie.

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

8 Pet peeves! - Coffee & Conversation

I know you are more like me than you think you are.

I know you have some Pet Peeves.

Here are 8 of my Pet peeves. 

Disclosure:  they may have been rather influenced by not getting my full night's sleep.

1. People who park where they shouldn't so that it is difficult for the people who should be able to park there to get a spot.

2. People who say you never told me that when you know you have but they don't pay proper attention.

3. People who say they told you something when it was really the other way round.

4. People who start telling you about something you should do when you had told them about that ages ago.

5. People who leave everything to the last minute.

6. Movies made from books but the endings or even more than that are changed, the book was good because of how it was written and the outcome so why change it. 

"I've got 8 Pet Peeves today!"

7. Dogs who bark early in the morning and wake me up.

8. Husbands who wake you up 10 - 20 mins before your alarm is due to go off and you know you have no chance of getting back to sleep, why do I have to miss out on that last bit of sleep? Makes for a bad start to a Saturday morning, and this is from the man who has shared nearly 39 years of Saturday mornings with me.

Feel Free to list some of your Pet Peeves in the comments.

Pondering the Psalms - Psalm 95

Today I'm looking at Psalm 95 

This is one of Encouragement to come to God with Praise and Worship

This Psalm falls into 5 parts:


V. 1-2
A Call to Praise

V. 3-5
The Reason Why

V. 6
A Call to Worship

V. 7
The Reason Why

V. 8-11
A Prophetic Word of God

"The way to go deeper with God"

A Call to Praise.
The way to come and approach The Lord: singing, joyfully, knowing He is our rock, thankfully, remembering our Salvation.



The Reason Why.
He is a Great God.
He is a Great King.
All of the Earth is His.
All of the Sea is His.
Everything is His.

A Call to Worship.
The way to go deeper with God: with reverence, humility and awe of our Creator.



The Reason Why.
We are His People and He is our God.  He is the one who protects and cares for us.



A Prophetic word of God.
A Reminder not to be like the Israelites in the wilderness when they hardened their hearts, tempted God and looked to themselves and not God.

The first part of the Psalm seems to be the instruction of how we are to pursue 
our relationship with the Lord

The second part is how not to have the right relationship.

Peril at End House - Book Review

Disclaimer:
There is an affiliate link on this blogpost.

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

Peril at End House 

1932

Description

Nick Buckley was an unusual name for a pretty young woman. But then she had led an unusual life. First, on a treacherous Cornish hillside, the brakes on her car failed. Then, on a coastal path, a falling boulder missed her by inches. Later, an oil painting fell and almost crushed her in bed.

Upon discovering a bullet-hole in Nick’s sun hat, Hercule Poirot decides the girl needs his protection. At the same time, he begins to unravel the mystery of a murder that hasn’t been committed. Yet.

My Thoughts

This is the 15th book by Agatha Christie and the 7th Poirot Mystery

The clues are always there.  No matter what they say - the clues are always there.

That is exactly how it is with this book which means that once you have read it (and no doubt missed some clues) you will enjoy reading it again later even though it is one of those books that you will remember who the murderer is.

But would anyone other than Poirot have solved this one?   In fact I actually think Miss Marple would also have spotted the very deviousness of this murderer.

A clever thought out murder mystery with a clever and vile murderer.

Great read.  Great deduction.

If you would like to know more about this book then click on the title or picture above.

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


If thinking of reading this book in the future why not pin this pic to go back to later.

Disclaimer:
If buying through Amazon via the link above I get a little commission but that does not mean any extra expense to you.

Where's YOUR Name? - A Dose of Encouragement

In my last Dose of Encouragement  I talked about how we personalized Christmas and today I want to tell you about the Personalized Bookmarks I started to make many years ago.

There were 3 different designs:
2 for girls names
and
1 for boys names.


For the girls names I chose hearts and butterflies and if you have read much of this blog these choices will not surprise you as I Love Hearts and I Love Butterflies.


I have recently written about a simple little Heart Recycle, previously I had done a kids craft post for a Heart Themed Valentine Banner  and in an earlier Dose of Encouragement I shared about how I was Missing the Butterflies in the garden of my new home.

For the boys names I chose books and it is obvious by the Book Reviews on this blog that I Love Books.

Now often when I would be at a Craft Fair or other event selling the bookmarks I would hear children and adults talking to each other and saying

 "Where's MY Name?"

There always seemed to be some expectancy in that question.

Mostly this was simply from someone who wanted to see their name on a bookmark not necessarily to buy one.  But because I also had the meanings of the names on the bookmarks it was sometimes from people who were just interested in knowing the meaning of their name.  This part of it would attract their attention.

"Where's My Name?"

Then there was another question they would ask me

     "Have you got MY name?"

There was always a bit of hope in that question but not always any expectancy.

This would be from the people who really felt they had little hope of seeing their name on any personalised items but it was worth a try.
Like people who had a different spelling of the name compared to others or their name was a very unusual one.


My sister is called Averil and because it is spelt with an "e" she could never find anything with her name, in fact people would often write her name without the "e" thinking they were correcting it. Then she named her daughter Clair without the "e" and they both ended up rarely finding anything personalised for them.

I know that my sister and I had often looked through stands of personalised items in shops just in the hope that one day we would be able to buy something for Clair many years ago when Clair was young, now over the years the odd time we have managed to find Clair's name but not Averil's.


When I heard that question at a craft fair I would ask the person what their name was and help them find it in my bookmark stand or explain that I was sorry I did not have their name but perhaps they would like me to take their name and address and I would make one specially for them.

For the people with names that could never be found this was quite a surprise and also a pleasure to know that someone could offer them something they had as yet never been able to find.
I could simply have said "sorry I don't have that name" and have left it like that but of course that would not have been so good for me trying to sell my items or so nice for the person who had already felt rejected over their name.

Today I was thinking on these two questions and the offer I could make to people.

Then about the question so many people ask themselves with some hope but no expectancy

"Will I go to Heaven?"

"Will I go to Heaven?"

I'm glad that I have the hope and expectancy of my home with Jesus in Heaven.

I'm glad that the Bible tells me my name is written in Heaven.

I'm glad that when I die I will not have to ask

"Have you got my name?"

with some hope  but not with any great  expectancy.

I'm glad that when I die I will not have to hear God say

"sorry I don't have that name"

Because I will be happy as I ask

 "Where's My Name?"

full of  expectancy  to see my name written in the
Lamb's Book of Life

I could make the offer to create a personalised bookmark if the person was willing to buy it.

God has already made us the offer of a life with Him in Heaven and He says we don't even have to pay for it, it is free for us because of the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross.


But why does it have to be through that sacrifice?


Well have a look at John 3:16  "For God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not perish but have eternal life"


Briefly

• God loves us and doesn't want us to be forever apart from him and suffer in hell because of our sin
• He made a way for our sins to be paid for by Jesus taking on our punishment
• He offers us full reconciliation with Him 
• We have only to trust that He means what He has said and will keep His promise, but then if He didn't why would He let His own Son suffer

(see the 3,2,1 video on the sidebar for a fuller explanation)



It's an offer of salvation but we have to accept it.

Now I have a question for you.

Where's YOUR name?

If you have read this far then either you have already accepted God's Salvation and you share that hope and expectancy with me or you are in the place of knowing that you want this gift but have as yet not made that step of accepting it.


Please don't hesitate any longer.


It's an offer you have to accept.

"It's an offer you have to accept"

If you want more help on this please watch the  3 2 1 Video in the sidebar

Think Twice! - Coffee & Conversation

Have you ever had the feeling that someone was annoyed at you for something that you had done or said or written that was not what you had actually done, said or written but they just thought it was?

I was on the Hometalk Website one day and decided to leave a comment on a kid's craft someone had shared.

I mentioned that I loved their idea and it had given me an idea for something to make for my SS kids.

A few days later I noticed that I had a notification that someone had replied to my comment.

In I go to see if someone was asking me what my idea was, or if the author of the post was saying thank you for the comment only to be really taken aback with what I saw.

The reply to my comment was a sharply written one which basically was asking

What did you mean by SS?

I was very thankful that someone else had already seen it and replied with

 "I'm sure she means her Sunday School Class" 

and I then replied to confirm that was indeed exactly what I had meant.



Glancing at the location of the person who had asked the question I saw we were writing to a lady from Germany.  Obviously she had taken another meaning for my abbreviation.


How many times do we take for granted that people will know that we mean?


How many times do we just assume that people will understand because we know what we mean?


Perhaps I should have known better because I had lived in Belgium for over 6 years and in that time conversed with many different nationalities on a regular basis and there were times when there were misunderstandings just to do with phrases used in one language and how they translated to another language.


I have also lived in the US for 3 years and remember an instance where something I said could easily have been misunderstood when shopping with an American friend one Christmas

Looks like we need to think twice before we write!

I teach English as a Second language each week and I need to think carefully how I say things to the students  -  so I should be good at this.

"Looks like we need to think twice before we write!"

Do you think twice before you write?



Have you ever written something that someone misunderstood completely?

Pondering The Psalms - Psalm 27

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


Today I'm looking at Psalm 27 

This is one of the Psalms of David.

This Psalm falls into five parts:

V. 1
Declaration

V. 2-3
Confidence

V. 4-6
Praise

V. 7-12
Teaching

V. 13-14
Hope


Declaration.
We need to physically say these words.
We need to speak forth the truth, to truly grasp that we need not be afraid
       
                        He is our Light

                              and
                                        He is our Salvation 

                                              and
                                                        He is our Stronghold


Confidence.
The speaking out as in the last two verses and the knowledge that there is no need to be afraid leads on to being confident about what we know God has promised  -  this makes me think of Psalm 34 
He has promised that He is on our side.

Praise.
The result of seeking God, wanting to live in His ways and being in His Shelter can only lead to us giving Him all the praise and thanksgiving we can.

Declaration, Confidence, Praise, Teaching, Hope.

Teaching.
Crying out to God, seeking His face and accepting His gracious help leads us to listen and pay attention to Him to learn what is the good and acceptable will of God   (Romans 12:2)
All because we are not leaning to the way of others or to our natural instincts but we are being focused on His way.


Hope.
Knowing God's promises, having gained confidence in knowing God's will and His way and being prepared to wait on Him has all come to the point where we know we have hope for now and for the future.

A Lighthouse and a Lifeboat

illustrations

of 

His Love stretched out to us.