“All around us are people, of all classes, of all nationalities, of all ages. For three days these people, these strangers to one another, are brought together. They sleep and eat under one roof, they cannot get away from each other. At the end of three days they part, they go their several ways, never, perhaps, to see each other again.” 

― Agatha Christie, Murder on the Orient Express

A luxurious （豪华）train stopped in a snowstorm（暴风雪）, a murder at midnight with some clues （线索） left, 13 passengers （乘客） with different backgrounds （背景） and personalities（个性） identified as suspects （嫌犯）, and one famous detective Hercules Poirot. Who is the murderer?

封闭式场景, 因暴雪而不再行驶的火车一节高级车厢里发生谋杀案，嫌犯只可能是车厢里的13个人中的一个。This is the classical Christie style!

Yes, Detective Poirot has no other means （方式）to help him in the setting except for interviewing（面谈） the 13 suspectives with questions and more questions. He needs to find out whose answer has logical （逻辑）problems and when a passenger will reveal （吐出） something by accident （意外的，不小心的）to him. The challenge （难点）for him is that all suspects have solid Alibis. And they all seem innocent （无辜）yet all seem possible as murderers.

Alibi 就是证明作案时间里不在现场的证据。交叉问话中，车上的每个人都有其它人供词说明自己作案时候不在现场，很头疼啊。

L: Plus, all 13 suspects are very interesting to study in the way Agatha Christie describes them. We, as the readers, seem to watching a show on the stage, where everyone is a good actor and everyone has a story. Yet, we know something is wrong there, and we know they have a mask covering them.

Q: That’s exactly how I feel! I tried to digest （消化）every word among pages to find the bugs! It is an extremely interesting murder mystery that kept me reading late into the night.

L: Well，the first success is that of using the clues left at the murder scene, and Detective Poirot figuring out the background of the victim, which provides him direction later on.

Q: 探案小说的好处就是布局里放下的线索，考验智力啊。尤其克里斯蒂年代没有什么花哨手段，纯脑力逻辑，非常满足聪明人的阅读口味。

L: It is such an interesting mystery, full of plot twists that I didn't see coming! I love it because no matter how many times I read it, I am still surprised every time. Each clue that Agatha Christie hides in the book fits perfectly together, every casual conversation between passengers are hints towards the end. Even the most experienced of readers may never be able to guess which clues create the solution to the murder mystery.