Such a clever book, I loved it.

A whole new slant on Agatha Christie's lost days.

A real must for all Agatha Christie fans.

Really believable charachters, the story, sometimes harrowing, is beautifully written.

I recommend this book wholeheartedly.

One of my favourite reads ever! This was both a mystery worthy of Agatha herself and a poignant, tragic, deeply moving, love story. The most heartbreaking thing of all knowing that there’s more truth than fiction to the events in Nan O’Dea’s story. I enjoyed that this was a work of fiction based on Agatha Christie’s disappearance. I found the book cleverly and carefully focused on the growth and the development of characters whilst deepening the plot of the novel. Very well done.

I thoroughly enjoyed this story, but not how I thought. The blurb had me sold on the concept for this story, but the delivery was different from what I expected. Agatha's disappearance has always been a mystery, so I was looking forward to this fictional take from the mistress's point of view.

The Plot had many more strands than I expected; this is only partly about Agatha Christie's disappearance and ties in murder-mystery, romance, and even historical fiction - that touches on the effects of the First World War and the plight of unmarried mothers in Ireland at the time.

While I didn't mind having so many plot elements, I imagine any readers who enjoy a focused piece of writing could find this book a bit frustrating, especially when an overview of the whole storyline shows a weaving in and out of different timelines. Add to this that while the book is being narrated by the mistress, Nan, she shifts from first person to third-person omniscient, describing the thoughts of other characters and things. Earlier in the book, Nan says she has filled in some blanks by using the details from her correspondence with another character.

However, there are scenes when neither of these characters is present. In the author's acknowledgements, Nina De Gremont states: "Nan's theories of lucid living couldn't have conjured a more perfect editor for this project than Jennifer Enderlin." This tells us that the narrator has used their intuition and judgement to guess certain events. I found this narrative style a little distracting.

The character development is perhaps my favourite part. I enjoyed that the wife and mistress were able to communicate. We slowly came to understand their perspectives and motivations in the same way they came to understand one another.

Nan's internal monologues often enhance the dialogue, particularly in her interactions and observations of Archie Christie.

Overall, I enjoyed this book. If this book were a painting, it would not be in the style of a realist but an impressionist -it's broad strokes for many of the elements, and somehow it works. As a fiction of Christie's disappearance, it doesn't seek to represent itself as accurate and truthful but instead enhances the fiction by portraying an essence of the event.

Agatha was not the central character, but I think the murder-mystery was a tip of the hat to her, while the romance slant was perhaps in honour of her writing as Mary Westmacott.
Thank you, NetGalley, for the advance reader copy
Links
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/4441001559
Youtube: https://youtu.be/do1uPbmeKQo
Storygraph: https://app.thestorygraph.com/reviews/67bc2325-b337-4505-8251-a5022899b9001
Blog: https://katjaweinert.com/2022/01/04/the-christie-affair-by-nina-de-gramont/

**2.5 stars **

I'll admit my sole attraction to this book was the Agatha Christie connection, that was the bait and like the greedy fish I am I jumped at a chance to learn more about the woman behind the book, and the mystery surrounding her eleven days disappearance.

Initially I found it very interesting that this story was told from the perspective of Nan, Agatha Christie's husbands mistress but sadly I soon realised that this was not my cup of tea. I know that as readers we will always be speculating about Christie disappearance and will probably never know the full truth behind those eleven days *still holding out for a lost account from Agatha Christie herself* I felt we were forced to rely so much on Nan's imagination. It was always what others had said or what she picked up on in later conversation- I felt she was just too far removed from the action to even add to the story. It hardly felt like there was any facts to this just pure speculation which I felt did not help to unravel the mystery.

Then there was the flipping back between Nan's own past and the present day, which felt disjointed-You'll be getting a glimpse into Nan's past and then be abruptly forced to come back from the present. I feel like this could have been condensed instead of being sprinkled throughout the book. I also feel as though much was done to make us sympathises with Nan due to her tragic background- but it made me dislike her greatly in the present because she just seemed callous and not genuine in any sense as she constantly flipped flopped between feeling guilty about causing such grief and havoc in Agatha Christie's life but reverts back to being selfish and whiny and seemingly trying to justify why she has to continue her affair with Archie.

Ultimately, I think it was an interesting idea but the execution of it fell short.

I’m a big Agatha Christie fan and I’m. It sure what I thought I was going to learn about the missing days. I didn’t get that. I got a leasing story but it wasn’t quite what I was expecting. That being said it was well written and kept me fully interested.

I’ve recently started to read my way through some of the Penguin ‘green’ classic crime novels, and Agatha Christie is quickly becoming one of my favourites. Anyone expecting an actual explanation about the reasons why Christie went missing in 1926 will be disappointed, but I was pleased to read about how much research Nina de Gramont had put into this book - whilst the plot is very unlikely to represent what really happened, the details about Christie’s life are true enough to enamour even an ardent fan of her work. As a work of fiction, this is a great read, and the story of Christie’s disappearance creates an intriguing premise that frames the real story here - that of Nan.

I really liked the character of Nan, and using her as the narrator creates an empathy that it is very difficult to gain here - Nan is, after all, the woman having an affair with Agatha Christie. Nan’s character is complex and beautifully drawn. We see her development from a shy, teenager to a confident woman, and the harrowing events that lead her there. The character of Agatha, for this is indeed a work of fiction, is not perhaps as well-formed - we only see her at one stage of her life, although details of her past are provided along the way. I commend the author for using Christie’s disappearance as part of the story, and not the whole story. It’s enough to pull in fans of the mystery genre, but not enough to create a reimagining of any more than the missing eleven days.

‘The Christie Affair’ is perhaps not as Christie-esque in its style as I was expecting, with the alternating chapters between past and present not being something that, to my knowledge, Agatha Christie even did; nor is the detective in this novel as central to the plot of Christe’s Poirot or Miss Marple tales. However, this is a modern mystery novel that is worthy of the genre and a very enjoyable read. The twists are clever and difficult to guess, the ending is completely satisfying and the detective solves his case - I’m sure that, Agatha Christie herself would approve!

The story didn’t go the way I expected; maybe I misunderstood the blurb. Expecting to read about Agatha Christie's lost days that have been written about and filmed so many times, I wondered what else there was to say about the subject, but being an Agatha fan, I was interested. This story is as much about Nan O’Dea’s upbringing within her family’s Irish roots, away from the mainland, as it is about Christie’s disappearance.

Agatha is seen in a different light in this novel. As a reader, I haven’t seen the real side of how Agatha was during the last days of her marriage and this author provides a personal point of view of how the famous writer deals with the episode of finding out about her husband’s affair and having to spend time with the third party, Nan. The name confused me, I was looking for a grandma until I understood.

The detailed information from the Ireland years is very good and informs the reader why she tries to become the woman who treats a married man the way she does. How her lack of devotion to the man escalates is a real concern, but when you're treated that way at the convent, maybe it's a natural instinct.

A review cannot tell you anything about Agatha's missing days because that might solve the issue many have discussed for almost 100 years. You will, however, become interested in the debate about what AC did during those days and wonder if this explanation fills the answers you require.

After receiving a free copy of this story, my review doesn’t change. I found it interesting and enjoyed Nan’s view of her circumstances and her world. Like most, I have no idea what actually happened to AC during those lost days, but you may wonder at this writer's ideas.

A fascinating telling of the story when Agatha Christie went missing for eleven days, as told by herself,

and the other woman, the adulteress Nan. O'Dea.. They both wanted the cheating husband, Archie Christie..

Nothing is clear as motives and intentions interact a fast tale involving war, an illegitimate child, and murder..

An atmospheric and tense read. A page-turning psychological thriller..

Told from the perspective of Nan O'Dea, Agatha Christies husband's lover, 'The Christie Affair' by Nina De Gramont focuses on the 11 days Christie went missing in 1926.

The premise of this novel promises a great deal:
- A mystery focusing on the queen of mystery
- The roaring twenties
- Large country houses
- An affair

However, for me it didn't quite hit the mark. Nan's perspective and backstory can never be as exciting as Agatha Christies, meaning that as a reader I was waiting for the parts of the novel that focussed on her perspective. Nan's past is a far cry from large country houses, opulence and excitement, so the book is often drear. Characters other than Nan's or Agatha's are cardboard cut outs, particularly Archie, Agatha's husband. Finally, Gramont's tendancy to move between different people's perspectives in the same section of the novel at times got confusing. Therefore I can only give this novel three stars, even though the idea is a good one.

An interesting perspective of what happened during Agatha Christie's famous disappearance. I found the story to be mildly engaging but I struggled to like the characters and found the social interactions to be highly improbable. I think that this title attracted me because I was hoping for more of a mystery but if a story about human frailties and feelings is your thing, then I would recommend this.

Agatha Christie never wrote or spoke about her eleven missing days in 1926 and took her secrets to her grave. I believe three other people knew the truth: her first husband, Archie Christie; her publisher, William Collins; and her agent, Edmund Cork - all now sadly dead. This is not the story of what really happened but it is a vast improvement on Kathleen Tynan's Agatha, and other attempts at filling in the missing pieces of the jigsaw.
The charm of this novel is in the invented characters: Finbarr, Nan and Chilton. The back story in rural Ireland is the best part of a complex plot. One must forget trying to discover what really happened. We will never know. This is one author's fictional version of events and must surely appeal to Agatha's legion of fans.

On December 3 1926, Agatha Christie went missing. Her car was found abandoned not far from her home in Surrey, but there was no sign of Christie herself. She was found unharmed in a hotel in Harrogate some ten days later. She claimed a form of amnesia, and no one ever discovered what had happened during those ten days, or the reason for her disappearance.
Nina de Gramont takes the known facts about this time and weaves an imaginative fictional account of the events, writing from the point of view of Agatha’s husband’s mistress, named in the novel as Nan O’Dea.
The story primarily is that of Nan herself, of her upbringing in London and her summers over in Ireland, and how she became the mistress of Agatha’s husband.
As the “other woman”, she’s not automatically a sympathetic character, and it can be hard to understand her motives. Details of her past are harrowing, as the story weaves real life atrocities into the fictional tale, and there is a sense of loss and a yearning throughout the book.
Nan herself finds herself in the hotel in Harrogate, where Agatha was later discovered, and like any Christie novel, guests at the hotel begin dying.
This version of Agatha has her own story to tell, and we find out more about her movements in the ten missing days, and how she ends up joining Nan in Harrogate, with a real life mystery to solve.
Part historical fiction, part murder mystery, the threads are woven together to create a climax that while satisfying, still leaves lots of unanswered questions for the reader.
I didn’t particularly like Nan as a character, despite everything she had been through but her story was strong enough to keep me reading, wondering how things would all work out. Even now, I’m not sure what was real and what wasn’t, and it’s a book I keep thinking about long after I put it down.
Many thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for an advance review copy of this intriguing novel.

Many thanks to NetGalley/Publisher/Author for an advanced copy of this!

This was a great easy-going read that had a great plot that kept the story going right through to the end.

I loved the characters and the mystery behind the book, I was eager to know how it would end.

The writing style was great and easy to get immersed in the story.

Would definitely recommend it.

The Christie Affair by Nina de Gramont is an enjoyable and smooth read that offers its own spin on the famous writer Agatha Christie’s disappearance. A mix of murder, mischief, sorrow, and romance that will keep the reader engaged.

With the exception of some genre elements, the author did not try to emulate Christie's style, and for that I am grateful.
I have to admit, I initially struggled to accept Nan as the narrator, for the whole first part of the book I waited for Agatha's figure to become central. The disproportionate amount of attention that is devoted to the characterisation of Nan and Agatha's characters, the former very thorough, the latter superficial, would not have bothered me particularly if it were not for the expectations created by the book's title. The real focal point of the story, however, is Nan herself, her past and her present. Everything else is secondary.

This is the first book I have read by Nina de Gramont, but I doubt it will be my last. Her writing style is very engaging and atmospheric. She has a way of pulling the reader into her fictional world from the very first page that I liked very much.

I enjoyed this story told by Nan, the main character but alternating perspectives in each chapter. It was skillfuly told and I enjoyed the way the various strands came together. A story of love, loss and unexpected friendships.

Interesting take on the disappearance of Agatha Christie told from the viewpoint of Archie Christie’s lover, Nan. This is a story of two halves – one told at the time of Agatha Christie’s disappearance and the other told some years earlier when Nan was about to give birth to an illegitimate child in Ireland and her incarceration in a convent in Ireland to be ‘looked after’ by nuns. This part of the story is full of despair and hopelessness, but this is countered by the story of Agatha Christie and her disappearance which is a much easier read. There is also a murder tied up as a third strand of the story which makes the whole thing sound complicated but on the whole it all works well together. The story is told well and the characters are fairly believable. Most of this story though, is fairly implausible but it is still a clever use of something that actually happened made into a piece of fiction. The title for me was part of the attraction but I was not disappointed in this unusual story. Thanks to NetGalley for allowing me an ARC of this book.

It’s a well-known historical fact that Agatha Christie went missing for eleven days in 1926 after an argument with her husband Archie. She never revealed why she went missing or how she ended up at a spa hotel in Harrogate. This novel by Nina de Gramont cleverly and inventively fills in the gaps, from the point of view of Archie Christie’s mistress Nan O’Dea.

The result is an interesting book, filled with romance, murder and the aching loss of a mother deprived of her child.

Thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley for providing a review copy in exchange for honest feedback.

The famous disappearance of Agatha Christie in December 1926 is told here in a totally different way than normal. Nan is the mistress of Agatha’s husband and her story takes centre stage. It is an exciting and also moving story.
This is a story that is worthy of being written by Christie herself. You may not like some of the characters but the women are so strong and well portrayed. This is a beautifully told and accurately set in the 1920’s. Agatha Christie’s legacy shines through and there as a lost child and a love story that is both moving and sad. Did she have a breakdown because of the affair or was there another reason? We will never really know and so the mystery remains and is fitting for Christie’s life and work.

I suppose it was my own fault, really: I had expected this to be a tasteful homage to one of the greatest mystery writers ever, an exploration of where Christie might have gone on those fateful days, with possibly a wee Christie-like mystery added in.
Now, I know it is a very difficult thing to come anywhere close to such an iconic writer, but even taking that into account, this book was a travesty which left me fuming with indignation. The author's basic premise was that Agatha Christie's path intersects, on those fateful days, with her husband's mistress (for whom he left her shortly afterwards). De Gramont doesn't seem to have the slightest clue of how society and the class system worked back then, and the incongruity of these two women meeting and becoming friends is beyond all logic, as well as lacking in any sort of tasteful delivery. The decorum and sensibility with which Christie (and the other female writers of the Golden Age of Detective fiction) write was a particular element of the genre (arguably despite how removed from reality it was) and the author's heavy-handedness was quite distressing. On top of this, Christie often used delicacy in the portrayal of characters, which was often vital to the plot and the eventual denouement.
Furthermore, De Gramont draws an insultingly inadequate picture of both the Magdalene laundries and the plight of soldiers returned from the Great War, and while this might be forgiven as a plot-advancing mechanism, there is no excuse for the hotel murder mystery, which has the bare bones of a few of Christie's plots but absolutely none of the logic.
Lastly, the character of Nancy, whether gold-digging, husband-stealing hussy, or a woman sadly unhinged by the loss of her child, is both horrible and unconvincing - but then most of the characters are flat and yet enabled by the author to commit the most ridiculous acts of irrationality. Don't get me started on the policeman who originally finds Agatha (I won't insert a spoiler here, but really??). I could go on, but if I were to pick up on all the faults in this book, we'd all spend far too much effort on a book that is definitely not worth it.

My thanks to Netgalley for the ARC of this book.

What a marvellous book that keeps on giving. I couldn’t put this down once I started reading it. A story told in three parts by Nan O’Dea. Mistress to Archie Christie, love of Finbarr, mother to Genevieve and in some strange way friend to Agatha.

The story is so much more than an account of Agatha’s days missing. It is a lesson in the harsh and sad reality of young women forced to give up their babies, treated as nothing more than dirt for believing in love, the harshness of war and its impact on those who came back. It is a love story, a murder mystery - but above all else it is a masterpiece that pulls you in and doesn’t let you go.

You and help but love each of the characters in their own way. You feel their pain and as the story unfolds you feel a sense of justice that they should not be denied.

This was the last book I read in 2021. I started it with a few days to go and wasn’t sure I would finish it before the new year. How foolish of me to have that worry. Once I started it - there was no way of putting it down. Nina de Gramont has excelled in writing a book so easy to read and full of twists and turns - a true talent and a book that you must read.

I was lucky to read an advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. It truly is a wonderful book and I will be buying a copy for my mother as a gift.