The Secret of Chimneys

Agatha Christie sends a cast of adventurers, con men, and royalty to a country house called Chimneys, where a murder and a lost cache of jewels set Superintendent Battle on his first case. Lighter and more madcap than her famous whodunits, the novel mixes espionage, secret identities, and Balkan intrigue at a brisk pace. It is early Christie at her most playful, already showing the plotting mastery that would define the genre.