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(The Novel's Cover from Goodreads)

First, I have to acknowledge that Agatha Christie is an extremely clever writer. She is indeed the Queen of Crime. She hid the facts so well yet it was right in front of us, she made the narration so awesome--such a clever first person as a observer point of view story telling and also she gave some subtle words that made our mind indirectly thought that this 'specific person' is a good guy, not a murderer.

The book was pacing slowly and nicely like usual detective stories. The beginning seemed so simple and kinda boring, about a murder of a wealthy man in a small village/countryside. Hearing this plot must have made your mind think of the most cliche motive that is heritage. If you think that heritage is the motive, then you're wrong. But we'll save the motive later, for when you read the book.

We were told the story by a man named Doctor Sheppard, he is the village doctor and since this village is so small, everybody knows everyone and everyone loves to gossip in here, since there were no other interesting things to do. The story starts when a woman named Mrs. Ferrars died. She was Roger Ackroyd's lover. About few days after her death, Ackroyd got a letter from her, saying she was being blackmailed by someone. Before Roger Ackroyd could read the letter, he was killed.

Doctor Sheppard got a phone call saying that Roger Ackroyd was killed, so he rushed to the house and with the help of Parker the butler, they called the police. These police investigations seemed boring and very ordinary. The case looked so ordinary and the suspect is Ackroyd's only step-son, Captain Ralph Paton. Captain Paton soon to be fiancee, Flora Ackroyd seeked after Poirot's help. The story still seemed kinda plain until Poirot's little meeting with all of the suspects. After that, the story begin to climb and it got more and more interesting.

Almost every suspect in this story lied, or you could say that the kept a secret. So Agatha Christie started to told the story from Doctor Sheppard's point of view about each and every one's little secret, until the story reached the murderer's secret--or you could say, the revelation.

Usually, we get Hasting as the narrator of Poirot's stories. I've read 3 Poirot novels (yes, that is not much at all) before this one and I've read it a long time ago so I didn't really remember how Hastings usually told his and Poirot's adventure. Well, in here Doctor Sheppard as the narrator was kinda underestimating Poirot's ability, which is I think people's usual way of thinking when they had just met Poirot (and almost every other detective in general detective novels).

Almost until the last chapter I could not guess the culprit. However, when I gather the clues that Poirot told and stated, I could immidiately guess who is the murderer and it shocked me. Just like the famous Sherlock Holmes said, "when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth." It was quite improbable but yet it was the truth.

So overall I think this novel is a must read novel for mystery/detective stories lovers like me. Goodreads gives 4.18 ratings for this book, I think this novel deserved the score, since the beginnings was a bit boring for me and the culprit's ending was kinda annoying.He commited suicide. (Oh suicide endings, how I detest thee)