Gorgeous cover! I could not wait to see what was under this five star cover. I liked the premise of Nina de Gramont’s story of the eleven days in 1926 when Agatha Christie went missing. Agatha’s husband has been having an affair with Nan O’Dea. He tells Agatha about the affair. Agatha leaves her daughter, Teddy with Honoria who is the nanny and doubles as Agatha’s secretary. The story is told through Nan. For me, it gets confusing at times for the first thirty percent of the book to the point I stopped reading for a week and decided to start again. I AM SO GLAD THAT I DID. After starting again, I figured out the author’s style. We are introduced to lots of characters who have secrets, are murdered, have love interests….I loved the last 40% of the book as secrets are revealed at several points. Nina de Gramont was very clever with the twists and turns as I DID NOT see them coming. My thanks to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for an ARC of this book. The opinions in the review are my own.

This story starts on the day Agatha Christie’s husband tells her he wants a divorce and continues through Agatha’s 11 day disappearance - only with a twist. The entire story is told from the mistress’s point of view.

I didn’t know much about Agatha Christie’s life going into this one so I had to do a lot of research and this book really deviated from reality in many ways, especially with that big twist towards the end. Because of that, I think I would have liked this even more if it had been about fictional characters.

That being said, this one was intriguing and kept me guessing. I thought it was really unique that it was told from the perspective of the mistress and how their lives were so intertwined in ways I would have never expected. There were some big twists that surprised me and this really was a wild ride of a book!

Thanks to Netgalley for an ARC: 3.5 rounded up. The author created a somewhat elaborate story to explain Agatha Christie's disappearance which involves other romances, unwed pregnancy, crimes, coincidence--and acknowledges it is fiction--even within the story. It's well written, if a bit long. The story is told from the perspective of the mistress, Nan, and does switch up the narrative from first person to third without explanation, which creates some confusion. The truth is unknown and this version is fiction, which is clearly stated. It was enjoyable and for historical fiction, mystery, popular fiction--well realized characters.

I really wanted to like this book but I was unfortunately too confused. I feel like there were plot holes that the author attempted to hide with the use of smoke and mirrors, thus being the ever changing narration perspective and not-fully-chronological dual timelines. I felt like I was being asked to suspend too much belief, and this was acknowledged by our narrator when she said that it may seem like there's details she shouldn't know but she's confident in them after piecing together other's stories. I really wanted to like this book. I just spent too much time wondering if I missed something or whose imagined thoughts we were in to really enjoy it.

Agatha Christie was my first adult mystery writer that I read and I read them all with great pleasure. It was my mother's collection and our local librarian thought I was too young for them. Decades later each mystery has been read many times. What really caught my attention was the woman who penned all of those mysteries. I read her romances, her non fiction and her autobiography - I read it all. Needless to say, I was eager to read this latest book and I wasn't disappointed.
Agatha never divulged the story of those missing 11 days so speculation runs rampant in many books. Here we have the POV of the home wrecker, Nan O'Dea (based on Nancy Neele, the other woman and second wife of Archie Christie). As this is speculative fiction, Nan shares her imagination as to what happened during those missing days. It's well written, has a good mystery in it and it was a very enjoyable reading escape. My only complaint has to be that Agatha wasn't in the story enough for me.
My thanks to the publisher St. Martin's Press and to NetGalley for giving me an advance copy in exchange for my honest review.

WOW!! What an imaginative reimagining of the eleven days Agatha Christie went missing. Based on actual events, the author has crafted a fantastical mystery to account for what happened during the eleven days Christie disappeared in 1926. Full of great historical detail (including the Irish Magdalene Houses), this story has it all! Love, loss, infidelity, murder, vengeance and more! I loved that the story was told largely from Arthur Christie's mistress's perspective. Highly recommended. This is one of the best historical mystery thrillers I've read in a long time. My only complaint was that I thought it dragged a bit in the middle. Much thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for my advance review copy.

I did not expect this book to bring me the emotions it did.  I was expecting a book centering around Agatha Christie, but really she is almost a side character in a much larger and complex story about things much worse than her disappearance for 11 days. This book did have a slow start and I was waiting for the mystery and the secrets and I was wondering why we were getting some seemingly extraneous details. I was waiting for the story from Agatha's perspective, until I realized what this book was truly becoming.  About halfway through I was hooked by the flashbacks (and so emotional about them) and from there things really picked up.  So many twists and surprises along the way; both in action and in the feelings of the characters involved. I loved Nan's narration style, she brings her own flare to telling the events of these days after the fact. There were different romance aspects that contrasted to each other and I really enjoyed. Overall, a slow start, but if you love historical fiction then I highly recommending sticking with it and you may even end the book with tears in your eyes as I did.

In 1926, an almost-famous Agatha Christie disappeared for 11 days. In this vividly-imagined novel, Nina de Gramont fills in the blanks of those missing days.

The story focuses more on Archie Christie’s mistress — and later his second wife. And in many ways her story is more interesting.

Recommended for Agatha Christie fans , and for all fans of domestic drama.

3.5 stars

Every mystery book lover knows Agatha Christie, the best-selling English author who crafted ingenious plots for her many whodunits. Christie had a mystery in her own life as well.

The facts are as follows: In December, 1926 Agatha's husband Archie Christie announced he was divorcing Agatha to marry his mistress. The next day Agatha vanished, and her car - containing a suitcase with her clothes - was found perched above a chalk quarry.

There was a hue and cry throughout England, and a massive police search for the missing writer. Eleven days later Agatha was found in a hotel in Harrogate, Yorkshire, claiming she couldn't remember what happened.....and Agatha stuck to that story for the rest of her life

In this book, author Nina de Gramont fashions a fictional tale about Agatha's disappearance.

*****

The story is narrated by Nan O'Dea, the 'other woman' in Archie Christie's life.

Agatha Christie's husband of twelve years, Archie Christie, is besotted with Nan O'Dea - with whom he's been having an affair for a couple of years. In December 1926 Archie tells Agatha he wants a divorce, as he's determined to marry Nan. Upper class British women like Agatha are expected to keep a stiff upper lip, but Agatha is devastated. The next day Agatha vanishes, leaving the Christie's school age daughter Teddy in the care of her nanny.

Agatha is already a famous writer, and her disappearance reverberates throughout Great Britain. Police around the country are put on alert, and Agatha's picture is in newspapers everywhere. Many people, including Archie, fear that Agatha is dead, perhaps having taken her own life.

Nan is fully aware of the pain she's caused Agatha, with whom she's well acquainted. Nan and the Christies travel in some of the same social circles, and Nan has been a guest in the Christies' home. Nevertheless Nan purposely set out to wrest Archie away from Agatha, for reasons of her own.

Much of the book is Nan's backstory, which is rather tragic. Nan was raised in a working class family in England, and spent many summers with relatives in Ireland, working on their farm. As a girl, Nan lost a beloved older sister and fell in love with an Irish boy called Finbarr, who went off to fight in World War I. Finbarr survived the fighting but came down with the terrible Spanish Flu, and - for various reasons - this was dreadful for Nan. Nan uses this history to justify breaking up the Christies' marriage.

In any case, Nan makes herself scarce when Agatha disappears, since Archie doesn't want Nan drawn into a public scandal. So Nan checks into a classy hotel/spa in Harrogate. As luck would have it, a husband and wife in the resort die under suspicious circumstances while Nan is in residence. A policeman named Chilton, who's in the area searching for Agatha Christie, is assigned to investigate the deaths of the couple, which at first glance looks like a murder-suicide.

Meanwhile, Agatha also happens to be in the vicinity of Harrogate, having an adventure of her own. Agatha tries to stay under the radar, but some people think she looks a lot like that writer whose photo is in the newspaper. 😃 After eleven days Agatha is found, none the worse for wear except she has 'amnesia' about her disappearance. To say more would be a spoiler.

In some ways the plot mimics a REAL Agatha Christie story, with plenty of surprises and twists, and an unexpected murderer revealed at the climax.

I enjoyed the story but didn't like most of the main characters - including Agatha, Archie, and Nan - who are self-serving and badly behaved. I do applaud the book for addressing problems faced by women of the time, many of whom had little control over their own lives.

Thanks to Netgalley, Nina de Gramont, and Macmillan Audio for a copy of the book.

An odd factionalized account of an absence that in life was much stranger than fiction. Magically descriptive with vivid chacterization of a woman who disappears after her husband coldly tells her he’s leaving, with his mistress, for a weekend away, and he doesn’t want his wife to join him. She absconds using the name of the mistress for her adventure accompanied by the father of her child, joined by the mistress

I didn't quite know what to expect when I requested this book. I do find the mystery of Agatha Christie's disappearance really intriguing. As I started to read the novel, I thought this was going to be a domestic drama about how society women in the 1920's had to put up with entitled men. And while this was a theme in the book, there was so much more going on.

There are really two stories happening at once. We do follow Agatha as she disappears for about ten days. But the far more interesting story is that of Archie Christie's mistress, Nan O'Dea. While in reality there was no Nan O'Dea (he did leave Agatha for a woman named Nancy Neele), the author creates a character that is so complete, I had to hit Google to see if this was actually Archie's mistress. As we learn about Nan's backstory, we begin to understand that her reasons for being with Archie are greater than just finding a well-heeled husband.

Then the book takes another turn. Someone dies at the hotel where both Agatha and Nan are staying. Was it just a tragic accident... Or was it Murder? Yes, this book does become a murder mystery. Predictable? A bit. But there were lots of twists and turns that made this solving this crime fun to follow. This was both a sharp commentary on what the lives of women were like in Great Britain in the 1920's, and a clever mystery that I think Agatha Christie would have loved.

What I Liked:

Characters:

Agatha, in the time when the book takes place, is not yet a famous novelist. Although she is starting to publish a few books, her husband Archie doesn't really take her seriously. Since we, the readers, know how successful she will eventually be, we cannot help but see the irony of just how little he thinks of her. We know Agatha will get the last laugh. But, we can also see how deeply his actions affect his wife. Women, especially those in "Society", were expected to put up with infidelity. When Archie leaves Agatha, he has the gall to tell her not to make a scene so as not to hurt his mistress's reputation!

At first, Agatha is devastated by the betrayal. She leaves to give herself time to think. What will she be if she is not Archie's wife? It felt like her life was over. I loved that she finally realized that she was better off without him.

Nan is Archie's mistress. Usually, I have very little sympathy for women who get involved with married men. But, the author made Nan such a whole character, I eventually understood why she made the choices she did. Nan's backstory goes all the way back to her childhood, and her first love. Their story is a tragedy that was probably very common ,all due to WWI.

Storytelling:

The storytelling is a slow burn. There are many flashbacks in the story that explain who the characters are. At first I found this a bit frustrating. What does Ireland have to do with the story? But, everything is done with a purpose. Much like all the little details in Agatha Christie novels. They all have meaning. This tactic really reeled me in and made me heavily invested in the outcome of the story.

Mystery:

What book about Agatha Christie would be complete without a death! At first, it appears that Agatha is dead, and Archie is the prime suspect. And his plan to keep his affair out of the spotlight fails spectacularly. I was very happy to see this slime-ball squirm.

Then there are two deaths at the spa where Agatha (and Nan) are staying. There are many small details in the scenes leading up to the deaths that become important later in the story. The mystery is what ties all the stories of the book together. This was so like an Agatha Christie mystery which made it incredibly entertaining, and satisfying.

This was one of my most anticipated books for 2022. While it was interesting, it wasn't nearly as captivating as I had hoped it would be. The story focuses mostly on Nan O'Dea, the mistress of Agatha Christie's husband, Archie. Agatha Christie and the 11 days she went missing in 1926 are used merely as a way to tell the story of Nan and how/why she became Archie's mistress. While the idea behind the story was intriguing, I wasn't that interested in Nan's story. All in all, it was a good book but definitely a disappointment given my excitement for it.

I immediately loved the idea of this book. The cover is gorgeous and the topic is intriguing.

This book is based on a true story - In April 1926, Agatha Christie's mother died and in August of the same year her husband, Archie, asked for a divorce because he had fallen in love with his mistress. Then, on December 3rd, Agatha and Archie had an argument when he planned to go away for a weekend to visit friends without her. Later that evening Agatha disappeared. There was an extensive search and a lot of news coverage around her disappearance. When she was found at a hotel 11 days later she claimed no memory of events and never discussed it again, even in her autobiography.

There have been many theories around these 11 missing days, but none have been confirmed. Some claim that she had legitimate memory loss or was in a fugue state. Others believe that she was suffering from depression and planned to commit suicide framing her husband's mistress for her murder. Others claimed that it was a publicity stunt for her writing or meant to embarrass her husband. No one will ever know the truth for certain as Agatha kept these secrets until her passing in 1976.

Nina de Gramont made an interesting decision in choosing to tell this particular story from the perspective of the mistress, Nan. She introduced what I believe is a completely new theory to the mix, using Nan's backstory as a way to explain why she made a conscious decision to steal away Agatha's husband as well as why Agatha left and chose not to discuss it. Nan tells us her backstory, as well as the 1926 timeline including Archie and Agatha's stories while speaking directly to the reader. I like the way this first person narrative made you feel a part of the story.

I know that Nan's backstory was supposed to make us sympathetic to her, but I just couldn't quite get there. I felt for her with all she went through, but it still didn't justify what she was doing. With that said, I didn't really like any of the main characters, Archie least of all.

In addition to the main disappearance story, de Gramont included a different mystery set at the hotel in 1926. The characters in this part of the book felt somewhat shallow to me and it wasn't quite as enjoyable as the rest. This storyline is, of course, needed to help explain other parts of the story, but I had difficulty fully connecting with it.

I enjoyed this story quite a bit, even without particularly caring for the characters or agreeing with their decisions. I do think that de Gramont took many liberties with the story to make it work, but the bones of the story were good. Unfortunately, I had all the twists figured out by about 60%. Nothing that happened after that point was very surprising to me, so while I did enjoy the story I can't say that I loved it. However, in the story's defense, I listened with my husband and when I told him all of my theories, he hadn't made the same connections, so maybe I've just read too many similar books recently. For reference, my husband is giving the book 5★.

3.5★ for me
#NetGalley #TheChristieAffair #NinaDeGramont

The Christie Affair is certainly fiction but a work that is based on an intriguing historical event. By Nina de Gramont it looks at those events around Agatha Christie’s disappearance for 11 days in 1926. Told from a character seemingly based on Archie Christie's mistress and second wife this book puts quite on spin on those events known and still unknown to this day.

Nan O'Dea's story is one in which Christie’s marriage is destroyed but she is not totally unkind in her depiction of Agatha Christie. To assume that they could have been friends in another setting is a stretch but who knows.

Interesting, adding to the speculation of those days that Christie was “missing.” I enjoyed the book always believing that Agatha Christie was even more of a mystery than the books that she wrote.

An ARC of the book was provided by the publisher through NetGalley which I voluntarily chose to read and reviewed. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

"Where were you?"
"I can't remember."

The disappearance of Agatha Christie is a story many know and remember.
A woman lost for 11 days only to be found with a sense of trauma and amnesia.

But what drove her to flee?

An affair between her husband Archie, and mistress Nan, spark a grieving wife to run away without a plan.

Nan on the other hand, has a story. One that unfurls into grief of her own with a sprinkle of hope of starting over.

I loved this book. Nina da Gramont was a new author on my radar who didn't disappoint.
She took a take on a a true moment in history and made it something much more.

Read if you love:
-the writing style of Taylor Jenkins Reid
-family drama
-the stories behind what's left after war
-star crossed lovers
-new beginnings
-the power of being a woman, wife, and mother
-the country side of Ireland, and city life of England
-a bit of mystery
-historical fiction

Why I dropped a star:
While this story was based off of a true story, I always struggle with a story that is based around adultery. BUT please know while it is the backdrop and important, it is NOT the romance or even the main focus of this amazing book.

Also the ending felt a bit "strange". I knew Nan was the narrator of her story, along with taking on her own "take" of different character POV, the ending of it almost being her book felt disconnected from the intro into the book. Although I did love the HEA aspect.

TW: some topics include adultery, rape, loss of a child, suicide while none of descriptive

Rating:
story-⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
characters-⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
steam- while this is a scandal.... this book is less than scandalous

Song- scared by Jeremy Zucker

Thank you St Martin Press for my Arc. I truly enjoyed it.

The lush green fields extended as far as her eye could see. The blue skies, dotted by fluffy white clouds, filled her with joy. The black and white dog jumped and romped beside her, feeling the happiness she experienced that exuded in this special place. She clutched the pearls around her neck, feeling their weight, a swelling of love in her heart. She hoped he’d join her here soon and that their love would carry on throughout the years with the war safely behind them now.

The Christie Affair is a fictional telling of the true disappearance of Agatha Christie. After finding her husband caught in an adulterous relationship she disappears for days and the whole country seems to be looking for her.

I’m a huge Agatha Christie fan and I was excited to give this book a read, but I must say… I was a bit bored throughout. This book was primarily told through the eyes of Agatha’s husband’s mistress, Nan, and while her history was interesting and heart-breaking to read about… I wanted more to be about Agatha. Agatha seemed to be more of a secondary character in this one.

A tinge of mystery, a scathing history, and a touch of romance… a look into the Queen of mystery that we haven’t seen before. If you’re a fan of Agatha Christie or enjoy a drama filled historical fiction… then you’ll want to try this book out.

Note: Thank you to Netgalley & publishers for allowing me access to this arc in exchange for an honest review! Please note that all opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

As soon as I received my copy of The Christie Affair, I pushed it to the very top of my list so that I could have a review completed before its release date next week.

And let me tell you, I am beyond disappointed.

The Christie Affair -primarily the story based on the true events of Agatha Christie's mysterious disappearance for eleven days in 1926- had the potential to be great, but unfortunately, fell flat.

The Good Things
1. Told from the perspective of Nan Christie -Archie Christie's second wife- each of the characters she encounters is intriguing and well-written. The author does a fantastic job allowing for Nan to offer a character in a way that she sees them, alongside how they are portrayed by others.
2. The cover is absolutely gorgeous. It is eye-catching and fitting for the story.
3. There are a lot of quotable lines, which I suppose is a reflection of the author's writing skills. 


The Bad Things
1. Because the story is told from Nan's point of view, there are parts of the story that seem extremely far-fetched. Yes, she admits on several occasions that she wasn't actually there for some of the events that took place and that her account is merely guesswork, but doing so takes away from the story significantly. Also, how are we supposed to believe that what happened to Agatha is entirely true? It is told from the perspective of her husband's mistress. Plus, from what we are led to understand right off the bat, Nan didn't actually know Agatha that well. (I'm aware this is fiction, but it still needs to be believable).
2. There are a lot of plot holes and certain events that don't entirely make sense. I don't want to delve too far into those out of fear of spoiling things.
3. About 70% of the entire story was either boring or full of useless information, including a lot of Nan's background that had little to do with the main story. In my opinion, took away from the point of the story: to tell where Agatha really was when she disappeared. 


I am giving this two stars because I honestly did not enjoy reading this book. Maybe I had too high of hopes for it, or perhaps I just expected a different kind of story, or maybe, just maybe, the book is unnecessarily overhyped.

The Christie Affair by Nina de Gramont is brilliant! As an Agatha Christie buff I have read many books about her and those eleven mysterious missing days which she herself claims to have had amnesia and does not remember in 1925. Her own autobiography skips them! But in the Christie Affair, de Gramont gives probably one of the greatest hypotheses to what could have happened to Christie with amazing plot twists and turns, even a murder!

So, the story begins as they all do. Agatha’s husband, Archie asking her for a divorce. He had been having an affair with a young woman named Nan O’Dea whom he has fallen in love with. He would later marry her. There was arguing, (the servants heard it), Archie leaves. Then Agatha disappears leaving letters to Archie and to her daughter’s nanny. Her car is found abandoned.

But the difference with this book is The Christie Affair looks deeper into the mistress’ life and any part she may have played in the drama of the disappearance. Nan O’Dea had a happy childhood, living in England and visiting relatives in Ireland every summer. There she meets a boy and falls madly in love. But he goes off to war, and she a nunnery where she witnesses abuse and tragic loss.

Flash forward to how O’Dea is able to get the attention of Archie and seduce him for reasons which only become known (to the reader) much later. O’Dea was a fixture at the Christie home and Agatha seemed to accept her. O’Dea feeling Agatha did not know of the dalliance with her husband. Oh, how she misjudged Agatha’s intelligence!

This tale goes far beyond what those missing days may have been like for Christie. It also delves into what Nan O’Dea was doing as the world awaited the outcome of the fate of the missing famous writer. How their world’s will collide during that time. What the reader will find out is O’Dea had some haunting secrets of her own which just seemed to coincide with the search for the missing author. Nan O’Dea had been plotting for years to take back what she felt was rightfully hers and no one was going to stop her.

Without giving any of this delicious story away, let me just say that I felt as if I was reading a true Agatha Christie novel filled with mystery, clues and shocking developments! Well done!

Thank you #NetGalley #St.Martin’sPress #TheChristieAffair #NinadeGramont for the advanced copy.

The majority of the world, to this day, knows who Agatha Christie is, even if they've never read a single word that she's written. I must confess that I only recently read, And Then There Were None, a few months ago and enjoyed it even though "locked room" mysteries aren't really my cup of tea. I would like to eventually read more of her works. As someone who is an avid reader, watcher, listener of true crime, and who grew up watching Unsolved Mysteries with my mom, I am fascinated by Agatha Christie's 10-day disappearance in 1928. Disappearance cases are the ones that intrigue me the most, because while most meet an almost certain doom, there is still hope that they can be found, alive and well, living out their lives under a new identity or at the very least, waiting to be rescued. Hope is such a sweet thing. I was drawn to The Christie Affair as it romanticizes what might have taken place during those 10 days she went missing and why. Overall, the book is a fun read that keeps you guessing even if you know some of the real outcomes. What no one knows for certain though is what really happened or why she disappeared as she maintained until her death that she could not remember. Having only read one of her novels, I am no authority on Christie's writing style but it does seem that Gramont tried to emulate her style and it often read like a detective mystery of old. However, there seemed some inconsistencies and disconnect in several parts where it was hard to decide whose point of view she was referencing. She seemed to slip into other points of view other than Nan's whose account it is that we are receiving. A great story has several layers and while this was multi-layered and each layer was interesting in its own way, it felt disjointed in its execution so much that it almost seemed three separate stories rather than one tied together seamlessly. I wanted to love it more than I did but I do think fans of Agatha Christie and historical fiction, in general, will enjoy the story.

DNF: 8%

I really tried to like this one. While I enjoyed the writing style and how things were set up in a nonsensical way, I did not like how the main character broke the fourth wall repeatedly. It just didn't suit the story all that well, personally, and I've decided not to continue.