The Best Selling Author of All Time

Agatha Christie
1890-1976

If you have never heard of Agatha Christie until now, then maybe you had no idea her book sales come in at around 2 Billion. Her books come in third best-selling only after the Bible and Shakespeare. Yes. I'm surprised too. I'd thought it would be JK Rowling, or perhaps S. King, or even D. Koontz, and no other author of romance or any other genre can claim this. She is dubbed the "Queen of Crime".

With 66 crime novels, 14 short stories and the longest running play, a murder mystery called "The Mouse Trap", her best known characters are Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple. Christie was a fan of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, and was the inspiration for her Hercule. She had only 6 rejections. I say "only" because most of us have many more than a handful before our first publication.

Born in an upper-middle class family, she taught herself to read, and was a voracious reader, and was surrounded by strong and independent women. She was raised in a house of esoteric beliefs, she and her siblings believed her mother a psychic (which I don't doubt).

During WWII, Christie worked in a hospital and learned all she needed about poisons. Well, well. It's a good thing she became a novelist rather than a murderess.

Her first marriage was not to last. Her husband asked for a divorce, having had an affair with another woman. I'm sure this devastated Agatha, as soon after she disappeared and made headlines.



Christie had no memory of what happened to her. Her car and clothes were found at a chalk quarry, and everyone assumed the worst. She was gone from December 3rd to December 14. She made no mention of this there after in any of her writings.  This would there after be called her Fugue State.

On a trip to an excavation site at Ur in 1930, she met her second husband, Sir Max Malloway. Her fame as an author far exceeded his in archeology.

I've long wanted to read a Christie book, and I've finally found Murder on the Orient Express, which was not the original title. It was titled "Murder on the Calais Coach" when it first appeared in 1934.


The book now has its newest cover from the latest movie:

I hope to see the movie soon, and so will not read the book as yet. But soon. I'll post on both movie and book and differences.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Scam Insurance Notices

Hi, everyone. This post is just a warning to any of you who may be getting notification of any insurance company who send you emails or regular mail that they have signed you up automatically for next year's premium.

I've been getting emails from what claims to be Blue Cross Blue Shield, saying that they've automatically signed me up for next year's insurance so that there won't be any "interruption" in services. First of all, we did not have BCBS last year. Secondly, even if we had, the quoted price per month at over $2,000 is more money than I make per month!

When we got a letter in the mail claiming that they (BCBS), had reviewed our renewal form and we were accepted, we knew this was bogus since we never made any such deal with them at all, and we didn't have their insurance to begin with.

My husband was hopping mad and called the number provided. When he spoke to the woman he made it known that we didn't even have their insurance last year, nor do we want it this year. Eventually, after going around a few times (and he refused to give out any personal information, such as date of birth or especially social security) she put us on hold. It may have been 10-15 min. and this man came on and seemed to think this was a fresh call.

That was a red flag.

After Dennis told him that we'd been put on hold for 15 min, he still insisted ours was a fresh call. Once we got into the meat of the matter, he asked us to tell us the address from where this letter came from. We told him it said Florida. He said that they are based in Texas. He was pretty sure that we'd been shammed--not that it was news to us, but really, someone else would probably be tricked by it. The offer to not have to go through the market place--which you do have to do!--and just go ahead with whatever they were telling you to pay is very scary. The man said we should report it to our attorney general (which I think is someone who just got the job in Illinois), although he had not heard about something like a scam like this as yet. WEll, he has now!

The next day we got our bill in the mail from this place claiming to be BCBS, at over $2,000/month. We happily tossed it in our bin where such is burned.

First of all, I'm sick of being billed for something I can't use. My husband went to have wax removed from his ear this summer because he could no longer hear. This was done at a local place and the procedure was so simple it could be done at home with a spray bottle, water, hydrogen peroxide, and a tube. We had to pay a $30 co-pay. Then we got a $30.** bill in the mail from them. And still had to pay our insurance company--who came out ahead on the deal.

I've come to the conclusion because we've paid for insurance and they can't even pay for a simple thing like that, we may as well not buy it this year. It's just not worth it. I find it ridiculous people are forced to pay for this insurance and it doesn't do anything. We're both in good health, and knock on wood, should stay that way for a while. This year the price is ridiculous. Sure you can go with lower payments, but you don't get anything covered, and you can't even go see a local doctor. You may as well not have it.

I've had it! Dealing with the whole thing has gotten crazy and annoying. I'll pay the penalty. I'll be 64 next August so at least I won't have to worry about it.

Anyway, just be careful, whatever you do, don't believe anything coming from some insurance company that claims you're already signed up, and for goodness sakes, don't pay for something you didn't get through the market place first!

Sherlock Holmes - My Newest Obsession

The distinguished profile, the pipe, the deer-stalker's hat--this can be none other than Sherlock Holmes.

I love a mystery. As a teen, or young adult I spent Sunday mornings watching Sherlock Holmes played by the well known actor Basil Rathbone, who to me was a great actor and seemed to bring Holmes to life on screen for 20th Century Fox and Universal Pictures.


I've now turned to Jeremy Brett, a later adaptation by Granada Television (1984-1994). These made for TV shows with Brett are more accurate to the late author, Conan Doyle's stories, but I suspect that copyright had everything to do with what they could and could not do with them back in the late 1930-early 1940's. From what I was able to ascertain was that Doyle's works (Homes & Watson) "expired in the UK & Canada at end of 1980, was revived in 1996 and expired again at end of 2000. The author's works are now in public domain in those territories. All works published in the U.S. before 1923 are in public domain."


The first set of stories were published between 1887 - 1893. Conan Doyle killed off Holmes, stating he wished to devote more time to his historical novels. What was intended to be his last Holmes work was called "The Final Problem", which pitted Holmes against the greatest criminal mind, Professor James Moriarty. Holmes takes a trip to "the Continent" with Watson, who is mystified by his friend's behavior, and this strange trip where they try to keep one step ahead of Moriarty who has, in the beginning of the story, threatened to kill Holmes if he doesn't stop his investigations. Which, of course, Holmes refuses to do.

Watson and Holmes arrive in Switzerland, seemingly enjoying a holiday, but Holmes keeps a watch, and carefully scans the distance and sees that Moriarty has figured out his destination. But he says nothing to Watson, not wanting to alarm his friend. Holmes has come to the conclusion that this may be his final battle, that if he rids the world of this fiend, he has done his ultimate in his fight against all crime. Even if it means his death.

The two do-gooders reach a nice village inn, seeming to enjoy themselves. The owner suggests they go up to Reichenbach Falls (now very famous because of the writing of this piece of fiction, and has a plaque there about this famous adventure, where for fans of the famous detective is a desired destination.)

Moriarty and Holmes meet on the cliff at the falls. Holmes asks Moriarty for a little time to write to his friend, Watson, explaining what happened, and he grants him time to leave the note, so that his friend, and the world would know what happened. The note is rather short, but to the point and for Holmes he says this was his ultimate tryst with the most dangerous, most cunning criminal he has ever faced, and to rid the world of him was his ultimate goal in life. Even if it ends his own life. What a tremendous ending the the greatest detective the world has ever known.

Holmes and Moriarty in mortal combat before they both fall off the
cliff of Reichenbach Falls

Of course, the public wasn't to be silenced just because 

Holmes had supposedly died. 

They demaded more Sherlock Holmes stories. 

Having so thoroughly killed Holmes off, Doyle had to bring him back, and did so in "The Adventure of the Empty House" in which Holmes returns to his lodgings as himself, but in a disguise goes to Watson's office and nearly scares the life out of him when he reveals himself. His disguises always threw Watson, but the poor man thought him dead and to see him there in his office was a shock.

Holmes aficionados refer to this period (1891-1894) as the Great Hiatus. No one knows precisely what Holmes did or where he went during this time, although in "The Empty House", there is some explanation--he went to France, was in contact with his brother Mycroft, who sent him money and kept Holmes's secret as well as his lodgings in tact (and I suppose paid during those years of self-inflicted hiatus.) 

To my knowledge (correct me if I'm wrong), no one has written a continuing account of what Holmes did afterward. Doyle certainly did not.

After realizing that there was a hole in his adventures, so to speak, I had a night of sudden inspiration and wrote a short chapter about what happened next. This is going to be worked into my next Lainey Quilholt murder mystery (3rd book), where a character in the book is writing it--a book called "The Lost Manuscript of Sherlock Holmes". I thought it clever, anyway.

I'll have that piece up next time. Until then, all you Sherlock Holmes fans, I hope you enjoyed my little bit of history about Conan Doyle's most famous detective. He was so famous in fact, that people actually thought he was a real live person. Even to this day letters go to 221B Baker St., London, England. And someone (sort of like Santa Claus), answers them.