A journey with Poirot

Well, here we go. The caustic, cynical wit of my first blog, "Fifty and Fed Up", has failed to win me the legion of adoring fans that I feel my erudite musings on football, television and other matters of essential importance deserve. So now I'm appealing to ... well, a different kind of reader.

I was going to say the nerd-ish - but that is a bit unfair.

Murder mysteries continue to be extremely popular among us Brits, and none more so than Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot. Nevertheless, you have to be a bit nerd-ish to take more than a passing interest in all the tales of the somewhat pompous little Belgian.

In recent years I have been collecting Agatha Christie's books and also the Poirot Collection of DVDs. David Suchet's masterful portrayal of Poirot has finally come to an end. I'm a couple of years behind on the DVDs but will hopefully have the complete set before too long.

So ... here's what I thought. I thought I would compare them. I would read a story, then watch the TV adaptation, then write about it. It could be a bit boring; it could be a bit nerd-ish; it could, however, be quite interesting. I hope I will be able to make it entertaining.

I've decided to follow the order in which the TV productions were made, rather than the order in which the books and short stories were published. It takes probably less than half an hour to read one of the Poirot short stories. This means I can comfortably read the story and watch the production in one evening. The novels obviously take longer to read, so I will need to work out a strategy than enables me to watch the two-hour adaptations as soon as possible after reading. Anyway, that's the plan. If you enjoy reading my observations do please make some comments.

I probably ought to add that this blog will, of necessity, contain spoilers: In comparing the written story with the TV adaptation this is inevitable. I write as one who continues to enjoy reading and watching Poirot - even though I know the storylines - and assume those who choose to read this blog will fall into the same category.