The Man in the Brown Suit is a work of detective fiction by British writer Agatha Christie, first published in the UK by The Bodley Head on 22 August 1924[1] and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company later in the same year.
Reviews were mixed at publication, as some hoped for another book featuring Hercule Poirot,[3] while others liked the writing style and were sure that readers would want to read to the end to learn who is the murderer.
Anne Beddingfeld witnesses an accident at Hyde Park Corner tube station when a man falls onto the live track.
Anne realises the examination of the dead man was oddly done and visits the Mill House where she finds a canister of undeveloped film, and she learns that 'Kilmorden Castle' is a sailing ship and books passage on it.
On board the ship, Anne meets Suzanne Blair, Colonel Race, and Sir Eustace Pedler and his secretaries, Guy Pagett and Harry Rayburn.
Colonel Race recounts the story of the theft of diamonds some years before, attributed to the son of a South African gold magnate, John Eardsley, and his friend Harry Lucas.
Harry admits that receiving a huge fortune worries him and that he has found his happiness with Anne, and they marry and live on the island in the Zambezi and have a son.
The review appreciated the "thriller-cum-adventure" style of the book and concluded, "The author sets so many questions to the reader in her story, questions which will almost certainly be answered wrongly, that no one is likely to nod over it, and even the most experienced reader of romances will fail to steer an unerring course and reach the harbour of solution through the quicksands and shoals of blood, diamonds, secret service, impersonation, kidnapping, and violence with which the mystery is guarded.
She has dispensed with Hercule Poirot, her own particular Sherlock Holmes, to whose presence and bonhomie and infallibility the success of her previous books has been mainly due."
"[3] Robert Barnard said about this novel that it was "Written during and about a trip to Southern Africa, this opens attractively with the heroine and her archeologist father (Agatha's interest in the subject was obviously pre-Max), and has some pleasant interludes with the diary of the baddie.
"[10] The Man in the Brown Suit aired in the US on 4 January 1989, adapted by Alan Shayne Productions, in association with Warner Brothers Television.
At least one review found the story lacking, feeling that those adaptations of Christie's novels shown on PBS in the United States fared better than this one, which aired on CBS.
[11] Adaptor: Carla Jean Wagner Director: Alan Grint Main Cast: The novel was adapted as a 2017 episode of the French television series Les Petits Meurtres d'Agatha Christie.
There were slight amendments to the text, either to make sense of the openings of an instalment (e.g. changing "She then..." to "Anne then..."), or omitting small sentences or words.
She raised no objections, however, as the Evening News were paying her £500 (£36,021 in current terms)[14] for the serial rights which she and her family considered an enormous sum.
[8] Christie was less pleased with the dustjacket of the book, complaining to the Bodley Head that the illustration, by an unnamed artist, looked as if the incident at the Tube Station occurred in "mediaeval times", when she wanted something "more clear, definite and modern".
[7] The Bodley Head were anxious to sign a new contract with Christie, now recognising her potential, but she wanted to move on, feeling that "they had not treated a young author fairly.