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Vicki, this is your thread for 2020. I have included the link to the required format thread and an example. If you had a 2019 thread - it will be archived so when you get the opportunity move over your completed books and formats to the 2020 thread - but we will allow time for you to do that.

Please follow the standard required format below - I hope you enjoy your reading in 2020. Here is also a link for assistance with the required guidelines:

Link: /topic/show/...

Our Required Format:

JANUARY

1. by Winston S. Churchill
Finish date: January 2020
Genre: (whatever genre the book happens to be)
Rating: A
Review: You can add text from a review you have written but no links to any review elsewhere even goodreads. And that is about it. Just make sure to number consecutively and just add the months.

IMPORTANT - THE REVIEW SHOULD BE SHORT AND SWEET - THERE ARE NO LINKS OF ANY KIND IN THE BODY OF THE REVIEW ALLOWED. NONE. DO NOT REFER TO ANY OTHER BOOK IN YOUR BRIEF REVIEW. THE ONLY BOOK CITED IN YOUR REVIEW IS THE ONE YOU ARE REVIEWING - NO OTHERS. ALL LINKS TO OTHER THREADS OR REVIEWS ARE DELETED IMMEDIATELY - THERE WILL BE NO WARNING. WE CONSIDER THIS SELF PROMOTION AND IT IS NOT ALLOWED AND IS IN VIOLATION OF OUR RULES AND GUIDELINES

Vicki, you are ready to go for 2020. We now have a special perk where we can list the books we want to read for the 50 Books Read in 2020. You also now have a Personal Reading List thread where you can keep track of what you want to read; and/or what you have completed etc for the challenge. These of course can be carried over to the next year's personal reading list if you do not complete your 2020 To Be Read list. You would simply do an edit, copy and paste.

Have fun with your two threads. Sample formats are included; but there is room for some personal preferences on the Personal Reading Lists. Have fun.

JANUARY

1. by Rex Stout
Finish date: January 5, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B+
Review: This is a collection of three stories, not as satisfying as a novel, but still entertaining. In the last story, Wolfe actually goes to a baseball game, because a famous visiting foreign chef wants to see one. Wolfe in uncomfortable situations is always amusing.

2. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: January 10, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B+
Review: Poirot and Hastings are on vacation at the seaside, Poirot having "retired." They encounter a young woman who has had several near-death experiences. In fact, when they inspect the hat she's left behind, they see a bullet hole and find the bullet nearby. Naturally Poirot offers his services. I think this is the first Christie mystery I've read where I knew whodunit, having watched the TV movie. It was interesting to see how the plot was constructed.

3. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: January 15, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B
Review: Who could have killed Lord Edgware, a rather unpleasant aristocrat? It seems as though his wife was with him at the time of his death, but she has an iron-clad alibi. So do others who would profit from his death. A very interesting denoument, as usual for Christie.

4. by Charles Dickens
Finish date: January 17, 2020
Genre: Classic literature
Rating: B
Review: There are two Martin Chuzzlewits. Old Martin is rich and ill and many in his family have "expectations" of him. Young Martin is his grandson, a pleasant enough young man but rather self-centered. He decides to be apprenticed to smarmy Seth Pecksniff to learn architecture. There he meets Tom Pinch, a sort of dogsbody to Pecksniff, but a very helpful and self-effacing sort. Another interesting character is Mark Tapley, who believes his main role in life is to be pleasant and cheerful under adverse conditions. Mark and young Martin go to the U.S. and buy some land in the middle of the country and in the middle of a swamp. When Mark falls ill, Martin takes care of him and becomes a much more thoughtful person. They are able to return to England, leaving behind the disappointing U.S. property. Besides Pecksniff there are several bad characters, the main one being Jonas Chuzzlewit, old Martin's nephew. There are also other helpful characters. It was an interesting book but I don't see that it's a "comic masterpiece" as mentioned in the overview.

5. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: January 19, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B
Review: This may be Christie's most famous book, with at least 3 filmed versions. A man is murdered on a sleeping car on the Orient Express, traveling from Istanbul to Paris. The car is packed with a wide variety of people, from an aged Russian princess to a fussy American housewife. He couldn't have been killed by someone from the outside as the train is stuck in the snow and there are no footprints. Poirot interviews all the passengers and exercises the little grey cells, thus solving the murder. It's interesting to re-read this when you know whodunit.

I recently decided to read (reread in some cases) all the Poirot novels in order. Up to this one, Poirot has been portrayed as retired with time on his hands, but this book starts in Aleppo, Syria, where he helped the French Army avoid a scandal (unspecified). Arriving in Istanbul he gets a telegraph summoning him back to England for an urgent case. Quite different from the relaxed openings of the previous books. Also, in the first few pages, Poirot is described as "lean", which is quite at odds with my pictures of him, influenced by his portrayal on TV by David Suchet.

6. by Rex Stout
Finish date: January 24, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B-
Review: I didn't enjoy this one as much as other short story collections. The first one, where a mobster hires Wolfe, and the second, where Wolfe hires a look-alike (yikes!) after he gets a death threat, weren't that good. I did like the third one better, where a man hires Wolfe because he knows he's going to be killed within days, and he wants Wolfe to bring the culprit to justice.

7. by Rex Stout
Finish date: January 27, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B+
Review: These stories were pretty good. It's interesting how the author manages to include mention of Wolfe's size in each story and novel. In the second one here, "Omit Flowers", on the second page he writes "His big face, which never looked big on account of the great expanse of the rest of him, was cheerful..."

Great adds Vicki.

FEBRUARY

8, by Agatha Christie
Finish date: February 1, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B+
Review: This book might be a warning not to invite Poirot for dinner - someone is bound to wind up dead. An elderly clergyman dies after drinking a cocktail just before dinner. Everyone believes it was a natural death since an analysis showed there was nothing but a martini in his glass. Some time later at another dinner, the host dies in the same manner. Everyone suspects the new butler, who disappears before the police can talk to him. Of course Poirot solves the case. Having recently seen a TV version of this story, I knew whodunit and how, but it's always interesting to read the steps leading up to the solution.

9. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: February 3, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B
Review: Poirot is on a flight from France to London when a dead body is discovered in one of the seats. It appears that she was killed by a poisoned blow-dart but no one can remember seeing anyone who might have done it. It is a small plane and only about a dozen people are in the section where the murder happened. The victim is a French lady who happens to be a money lender who guarantees repayment by blackmail. Poirot and some French and English experts in detection interview all the relevant people and he finally discovers the culprit, naturally. I was quite surprised by the identity of said culprit, but the solution was adequately explained.

10. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: February 8, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B
Review: Someone calling himself A.B.C. sends letters to Poirot claiming that he will commit murders that Poirot won't be able to solve. He starts with Alice Asher of Andover, goes on to Betty Bernard of Bexhill, then the C's and D's. Hastings narrates most of the book, with a few chapters in the 3rd person necessary to understand one of the characters. A very interesting plot.

Great progress and reviews Vicki

11. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: February 12, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B+
Review: This one is narrated by Nurse Leatheran, who has been hired to come to an archeological dig in the Middle East to look after the wife of the head of the expedition. She's been feeling jumpy and out of sorts lately and her husband doesn't have time to tend to her. The wife and nurse take to each other and all is going fine when, suddenly, the wife is killed in her bedroom. At this point, Poirot enters, being nearby and a friend of the local officials. We get to hear Nurse Leatheran's views of him - very amusing - and a look at the investigation and people involved from her POV. I had seen the TV version of this, so I remembered who and how the murder took place, but had forgotten the why. I always wonder how many of Christie's readers figure out the solution to her mysteries. Can't be very many, she doesn't really leave clues.

12. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: February 15, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B+
Review: Mr. Shaitana, a "Mephistophelean" character (that description was used multiple times in the book), tells Poirot he knows of 4 people who have gotten away with murder and he invites Poirot to a dinner to meet them. In addition to Poirot, there are 3 other sleuths at the dinner, including the first mention of Ariadne Oliver, a successful mystery writer. After dinner, the 4 murderers play bridge in one room, where Mr. Shaitana sits by the fire, and the 4 sleuths play in an adjoining room. At the end of the evening Mr. Shaitana is found dead, having been stabbed by a long thin sword which was one of Shaitana's collectibles, obviously killed by one of the murderers. The sleuths do their detecting and the villain is discovered. There's a lot about bridge in the story, including copies of the scores for all of the games, which turn out to be important for clues to whodunit. I really liked Ariadne, she's very funny. I wondered if her characteristics matched Christie's or were the opposite.

13. by Rex Stout
Finish date: February 16, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B
Review: This is another collection of three novellas, unusual in that Wolfe goes not only out of his house, which he hates to do, but out of New York City in two of them. In the last one, he and Archie are part of a collection of private investigators being accused of performing illegal wiretaps, and the person who hired them turns up dead in the building in Albany, NY, where they have congregated. It's a very interesting story.

14. by Rex Stout
Finish date: February 21, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B
Review: This is another collection of novellas, with four instead of the usual three. These were pretty good, especially the first one, which has a delightful twist I maybe should have suspected. In the first three, Archie just happens to be present at a murder, with Wolfe also there for the third. So they don't have clients per se, just need to get themselves out of a jam.

15. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: February 24, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B
Review: The first, rather long, chapter introduces the characters who will be on the cruise down the Nile. The main ones are Linnet and Simon Doyle, a newly-wed couple and Jacqueline de Bellefort, Simon's previous love-interest. Linnet is rich and Jacqueline is angry she stole her boyfriend. During the cruise Linnet is killed (naturally) and Poirot elects to solve the mystery. I had seen the movie of the book some years ago and thought I remembered who the murderer was but it didn't seem physically possible for that person to have done it. Even when you know the solution to Christie's mysteries, it's fun to unravel the clues.

16. by Daisy Dunn
Finish date: February 28, 2020
Genre: Ancient history
Rating: A
Review: This is a biography of Pliny the Elder and Pliny the Younger, his nephew. We know a good bit about them because many of the Younger's letters and speeches have survived, as has the Elder's Natural History. We know details of the eruption of Vesuvius because 18-year-old Pliny viewed it from his uncle's estate, while his uncle sailed across the Bay of Naples to rescue some friends. Unfortunately, the Elder Pliny was overcome by the gasses from the eruption and died. There's a lot in the book about the Younger's various properties, but no pictures. Too bad.

by Pliny the Younger
by Pliny the Elder

What sharp eyes you have, Bentley. Fixed.

Well I surprise myself sometimes (lol)!

MARCH

17. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: March 3, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B
Review: This is an interesting story in that one of the main characters is a little dog. Poirot has received a letter from the dog's elderly owner that was written 2 months before he got it, asking his help to clear up an unstated problem. When he and Hastings arrive at the woman's house they find out she died a few days previously. She had had an earlier injury from falling down stairs, presumably by tripping on the dog's ball. Her death seems to have been caused by liver failure. Surprisingly she has disinherited her nephew and nieces and given her substantial fortune to her self-effacing companion. Another interesting feature of the book is that Hastings' narration doesn't begin until chapter 4, with the first 3 describing the different characters and their relationships.

18. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: March 6, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B
Review: A tyrannical matriarch takes her family on a trip to the Middle East. Poirot happens to be in the same hotel with them in Jerusalem and overhears one of them say "You do see, don't you, that she's got to be killed?" He doesn't think much of it until a few days later he learns that the woman has been killed in Petra, where the family had gone. Even though he was not on the spot, he learns enough by interviewing those who were there to solve the mystery, natch.

That sounds good for my night reading.

19. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: March 12, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: C+
Review: This is another story about a tyrannical head-of-family. Simeon Lee is very rich and his children are dependent on him. He invites the whole family to his home for Christmas, where they meet a new member of the family, Pilar, who was born in Spain to Simeon's estranged daughter. After tormenting the children, Simeon is murdered, apparently in a locked room. Poirot solves the mystery, as usual.

You may have noticed that I've been on a Poirot binge, sadly interrupted because my library is closed during these stay-at-home days. I could probably get e-books from the library but I don't like e-books. Or I could buy some, but I'm too cheap. Hopefully it won't be too long until the library opens its doors again. Libraries are more important than restaurants, right?

Vicki, I feel your pain ... my Library is also closed. However, they changed the due date on the 8 books I have checked out until August 25th, so I at least have 8 books to read!
Regards,
Andrea

Well sometimes we have to try new things. And the ebooks are free. But I understand. I love paper myself but I have found it is heavy to carry and lug around.

20. by Madeline Miller
Finish date: March 18, 2020
Genre: Mythology
Rating: B+
Review: We all know that Circe is the witch in The Odyssey who turned Odysseus' crew into pigs. But that's not all of her story, and she didn't even do that. She starts her story with the Titans and Olympian gods, where she's just one of many offspring of the Titan sun god Helios. Zeus is angry at her because she gave succor to Prometheus after he had been condemned for helping humans. Also Zeus doesn't like that she's a witch and can create spells that even work on heavenly beings. He banishes her to a deserted island, where she practices her craft on some of the men who stop by her island and treat her badly. It's a very interesting story, with a lot of characters from mythology I had never heard of.

by Homer

APRIL

21. by Ann Patty
Finish date: April 13, 2020
Genre: Language
Rating: A
Review: When the author retired from book editing, she was worried she'd be bored and slip into alcoholism like her mother. She decided to take up the study of Latin since she'd always been fascinated by words, and her mother had been an excellent Latin scholar in school. She finds some college classes to audit and makes friends with the teachers and other students and discovers a whole new community to be involved with. I tried for a few months to study Latin on my own, but was too lazy. This book makes me want to try again.

22. by Rex Stout
Finish date: April 14, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B-
Review: This is another collection of three short stories. In the first one, Wolfe doesn't even figure out whodunit, just how to trap the person into revealing him/her-self. But the second one is pretty good. A young woman knocks at the door just as Archie is leaving, having quit his job with Wolfe. She needs Archie's help with a corpse in the cab she just drove over. A pretty intricate plot.

23. by John Mortimer
Finish date: April 20, 2020
Genre: Short stories
Rating: B-
Review: Another bunch of stories about that inimitable barrister, Horace Rumpole. In "Rumpole and the Official Secret" he defends a middle-aged eccentric clerical worker from charges that she leaked official secrets, to wit, the budget in her department for "biscuits" aka cookies. And in "Rumpole's Last Case" he's about to tell off Judge Bullingham because he's about to come into a fortune after betting on the horse races. I'll leave it to you to guess whether he actually quits.

24. by John Mortimer
Finish date: April 23, 2020
Genre: Novel
Rating: B-
Review: This is the novel I skipped while reading the short story collections. Rumpole and Hilda have left London and moved to Florida to be with their son and daughter-in-law. Things are too peaceful for Rumpole, away from the Uxbridge Magistrates Court and Pommeroy's Wine Bar. He gets a chance to get back in the fray when a letter arrives from Phillida Erskine-Brown asking a question about blood (Rumpole's specialty) connected to a murder case they're doing. Instead of just writing back, Rumpole hops on a plane and inserts himself back in chambers, much to the consternation of the two new barristers who have taken over his old room. The case is connected back to Florida by a weird religious cult, one of whose ex-members is the defendant. This novel is a bit less satisfying than the short stories, because a good bit of is happens out of Rumpole's presence, and the events have to be relayed to him by someone else, with him passing it on to us. But it's still a pretty good story.

MAY

25. by L.J. Trafford
Finish date: May 9, 2020
Genre: Roman historical novel
Rating: B+
Review: This is the first of 4 novels about the Year of Four Emperors, 69AD. It actually starts in 68AD, the year of Nero's demise. It's told mainly through the goings-on of various functionaries of the empire, some real and some fictional. An interesting historical person is Epaphroditus, Nero's secretary. Equally interesting is the fictional Philo, Epaphroditus' assistant. He's sweet and sort of clueless and rents a room from a family with an equally sweet daughter, who would be perfect for him, but he doesn't realize it. The first half of the book ends with Nero's suicide after there were various revolts against his rule, and Galba, the governor of Spain, was chosen as the next emperor by the army and many prominent politicians. The second half focuses on Nymphidius Sabinus, one of the Praetorian prefects, who believes he would be better than Galba as emperor, but is unable to get support, probably because of his insufferable personality. I'm looking forward to reading the next part of this saga.

26. by Ross Macdonald
Finish date: May 10, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B-
Review: I read all of Ross MacDonald's books years ago and decided to reread some of the Lew Archer ones. Even this first one is very good, although the story doesn't connect to events that happened years ago, like the later ones do, eg. The Zebra-Striped Hearse. I did notice this time through how many times Archer gets beaten up. It doesn't seem to discourage him, though.

by Ross Macdonald

27. by Rex Stout
Finish date: May 14, 2020
Genre: Roman mystery
Rating: B+
Review: This book covers the day-to-day happenings of Gordianus surrounding the Ides of March, in 44 BCE, when Julius Caesar was assassinated. It starts on March 10 with Tiro coming to say that Cicero wants to talk to him. There's some interesting conversation about the first time Tiro and Gordianus met years ago during Roman Blood, when Cicero needed his help in the court case that made him famous. Today Cicero wants Gordianus to check out some men who might be trying to do Caesar harm. After talking to the men on Cicero's list, he doesn't get any hints of a plot. Not long after, he's summoned by Caesar who announces he's going to make Gordianus a senator when the Senate meets on the Ides of March. There are a few more references to instances in other books in the series, almost as if this is a summing-up of his career. He's in Caesar's entourage when Caesar is stabbed, so he witnesses the dramatic event. Gordianus does his investigations in the company of Cinna the poet, who also knows all the interesting characters. There's a lot about two of Cinna's famous poems, a bit too much for me, actually. The mystery isn't really about Caesar's death, but is sort of tacked on near the end of the book. This feels like the coda of Gordianus' career. I hope not - I'd love to see him get involved with Octavian.

by Rex Stout

28. by Jane Austen
Finish date: May 23, 2020
Genre: Classic literature
Rating: A
Review: This book has one of the best opening sentences of all time - "It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife." The characters are very well drawn and the dialog is excellent. I did find Darcy's change of attitude a bit sudden and surprising from what we had been shown of him so far but it didn't spoil the enjoyment of the book.

JUNE

29. by Charles Dickens
Finish date: June 7, 2020
Genre: Classic literature
Rating: B
Review: Dombey and Son is a shipping company, with the current Dombey having been Son until his father's death some years ago. At the beginning of the book he is waiting on the birth of his second child, who he hopes will be a boy, his first one having been a girl (a severe disappointment). In fact it is a boy, to the father's delight, but the mother dies in childbirth. Little Paul is rather a sickly child, and is doted on by his sister Florence. As is usual in a Dickens book, there are many, many interesting characters. The main villain is Carker, the second-in-command at the firm, who has a formidable set of white teeth, which he shows off frequently. There are a bunch of much nicer characters who gather at The Wooden Midshipman, a naval instrument shop. My favorite is Susan Nipper, a hired, but fiercely loyal, companion to Florence. A really interesting book, with many connections between what seem to be disparate characters.

30. by Jane Austen
Finish date: June 13, 2020
Genre: Classic literature
Rating: B+
Review: Now that I've read all 6 of Austen's books, I'm struck by the variety of characters she portrays. Even the heroines of the books have different personalities. As for this one, I have to say that the heroine's love interest, Edward Ferrars, is pretty boring. I guess he just clicked with Elinore. And I always wonder how these people passed their time - no jobs, servants to do the cleaning and cooking. Apparently much time was spent in conversation, the rules of which you learned as you were growing up, I guess.

Vicki you have just read two of my very most favorite novels. The Dickens book really should be titled “Dombey and Daughter,�� for it is really Florence who proves to be her father’s true legacy. Sense and Sensibility is the ultimate sister-read, even tho�� I’ve never had a sister. Two marvellous reads from the early Victorian/late Regency period, they are hard to beat.
Regards,
Andrea

Andrea- do not forget your citations:

by Jane Austen

Charles Dickens

Sorry, Bentley, I get carried away!
Regards,
Andrea

31. by Tim Whitmarsh
Finish date: June 15, 2020
Genre: Ancient history
Rating: C
Review: This book looks at ancient Greek and Roman religious beliefs and examines whether there was a specific disbelief in the gods. It's gotten a lot of really good reviews here on ŷ������, but it just didn't grab me. Maybe if I'd read the reviews first, I would have gotten more out of it.

32. by Ellis Peters
Finish date: June 21, 2020
Genre: Historical mystery
Rating: B
Review: Very interesting to learn about how the fair operated and conflicts between the town and the abbey. This one was more about politics than the previous one in the series. Actually, I prefer the stories which deal with what goes on in the abbey, where we learn about the personalities of the various monks.

33. by Ellis Peters
Finish date: June 29, 2020
Genre: Historical mystery
Rating: B
Review: A young man, Meriet Aspley, comes to the abbey requesting to be a novice. He is obedient and zealous, but has terrible nightmares, so that the other novices think he's possessed. Naturally, a dead body turns up, that of an envoy from a powerful bishop, who happened to disappear just after leaving Meriet's home. Of course, Cadfael solves the mystery, with the help of under-sheriff and friend Hugh Beringar. One of the most interesting characters is Brother Mark, who is in charge of the hospital at St. Giles, which cares for lepers and other unfortunates who have no other place to go. He was Cadfael's helper at the herbarium (in previous books in the series) but felt that St. Giles needed him more. He befriended Meriet and helped him a lot.

JULY

34. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: July 5, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B
Review: This is the fifth Miss Marple book I've read so far and the best one. In the others, it seemed as though Miss Marple was called in at the last minute as a kind of deus ex machina, to solve the murder with a few comments. In this one, she appears rather early on and talks to several of the characters. A newspaper item says a murder will happen at a particular time at a local home and several neighbors show up, thinking it's some sort of game. But when a young man bursts in and shots are fired, it's apparently for real. The young man himself is killed and the owner of the house is nicked on one of her ears by a bullet. I had recently seen the TV version of the story and wanted to see how the plot was all put together. It was very satisfactory.

35. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: July 15, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B
Review: The book starts with Elinor Carlisle on trial for killing Mary Gerrard, a favorite of Elinor's aunt, who left Elinor her estate. Roddy Welman. Elinor's fiance, had fallen for Mary. Mary dies of morphine poisoning and it seems as though only Elinor had the motive and opportunity to do it. Of course, Poirot figures out the real murderer. I don't see how anyone could figure out the mystery - the killer seemed like a secondary or even tertiary character.

AUGUST

36. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: August 2, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B
Review: Poirot is on vacation at the quaintly named Jolly Roger Hotel on Smuggler’s Island. One of the guests, Arlena Stuart, is found strangled on one of the beaches on the island. Pretty much everyone assumed she was having an affair with Patrick Redfern, who was at the hotel with his wife. So there's a couple of suspects. Arlena was there with her husband and sulky step-daughter, so, more suspects. The police find some drugs in a cave near the spot her body was found, so maybe it was drug smugglers who did her in. Many interesting possibilities. Poirot sorts through all the clues and discovers the guilty party, as usual.

37. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: August 7, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B
Review: This is another story involving a mystery from the past which impinges on the happiness of a young woman. Carla's mother was executed years ago for murdering her husband, but wrote a letter to her daughter saying she was innocent. Poirot talks to five people (the "little pigs") involved in the mystery and has each of them write his or her memories of the event. An interesting but unusual source of info.

38. by Agatha Christie
Finish date: August 11, 2020
Genre: Mystery
Rating: B
Review: Not long after Poirot has finished his regular dental exam, his dentist turns up dead, an apparent suicide. The same day, another patient of his is also found dead, and it looks like the dentist poisoned him. Of course, it's not that simple and Poirot has to figure out what really happened. Each chapter is titled after one of the lines from the nursery rhyme of the book's title, and there's a reference to it in the chapter. For instance, in ch. 1, Poirot notices a buckle on a woman's shoe, and it turns out to be important later in the book. I didn't notice this until more than halfway into the book. I'll have to reread this one in a few years and pay attention to this feature.