Published By: Canongate
Pages: 352
Released On: 10/09/2026
One Christmas, Cathy Rentzenbrink finds herself drained by life’s upheavals. In need of comfort and escape, she turns to her first literary love: Agatha Christie.
As Cathy delves into Agatha’s novels and her mysterious disappearance in 1926, she discovers more than she expected. Beyond the hidden jewels, detectives and thrilling escapes on trains and automobiles, Cathy unearths an adventurer and innovator who hid – within the pages of her own books – the secrets of how she survived a personal crisis and started life again. With the Queen of Crime at her side, Cathy soon begins finding answers to questions she hadn’t even realised she was asking.
A literary detective story and a memoir of finding hope in reading, this journey into the heart of the most successful writer of the 20th century is the perfect tonic for anyone in search of life-affirming resilience, and proof that if ever you’re lonely, tired and in need of solace, getting in the bath with an Agatha Christie is always an excellent idea.
*****
Thanks to NetGalley and Canongate for the advanced copy of this title in return for an honest review.
Agatha Christie + Cathy Rentzenbrink = I mean, what more do you want. As much as I was desperate to read this, I did wonder how it worked. How could reading Agatha Christie’s whodunnits really change a person’s life? But I was immediately hooked.
I will start with the negative point though. There are passages I had to skip because she talks about the plots of the books, and whilst I can’t shout SPOILERS at her when talking about 100-year-old books, I want to be able to go into the books not knowing what happens. So in the passages where she is discussing the characters, the scenes, the victims etc. I just glanced over without focussing too much on the plot she was divulging. But this does mean I will probably keep this book on my Kindle and re-read it once I have finished my Christie read-athon. But I would probably suggest that the finished copy needs something at the start that explain that there are spoilers for all of Christie’s books, and for those who want to go in blind should either leave tis book for another time, or know that you really need to skip roughly every other chapters, that way you get the bits about Cathy’s life and how the books affected her, but without finding out plot points. I suppose in a way that’s what makes this book a lower star rating than normal, because I couldn’t read it all.
I actually plan to do exactly what Cathy planned, which is to read the Poirot and Marple books in order. I own about half a dozen of Poirot, two or three Marples, and then a handful of unrelated books. I am determined to collect the sets so I can settle down for my big Christie read-athon.
Whilst I tried to avoid the spoilers she had included, I did enjoy reading how Cathy herself might have written or edited passages. I didn’t think I would because, why are we editing Agatha Christie of all people? But I love Cathy’s use of language so I saw it less trying to improve upon Christie and more about showing the breadth and depth of Cathy’s storytelling. It was about adding to Agatha, not replacing.
You can’t deny Cathy’s writing and storytelling ability – she is one of my favourite authors for her sheer talent at putting words on a page to move the reader.
But yeah, that’s why you haven’t got a really long review this time because I didn’t read it all and so can’t comment on it all.
Books By Your Bedside 