Joshua Corin:

One year, when I was 11, I read all of Agatha Christie. I began with The Mystery of the Blue Train because it was one of six Christie books my school library owned (and because, well, I was intrigued by the idea of a blue train).

What first brought me to Christie remains a mystery (and rightfully so), but I enjoyed the novel’s exotic setting, the central puzzle, and, most of all, the quirky, arrogant, morally righteous Hercule Poirot. So, I read the other five books in the school library and then moved onto every other Christie book at my city’s library and then, finally, to the remaining books on my list, which required my mom to drive me to farther-away libraries, eventually reaching the far corners of the state (though, let’s be clear, that state was Rhode Island). I read all of Christie, adored much of it, and had fond memories of my time with her. 

About 30 years later, and now a crime writer myself (and caught up in midlife nostalgia), I decided to revisit those memories. I picked up The Mystery of the Blue Train and reread it. I was surprised how much of it I remembered (though, fortunately, not the identity of the murderer). I was more surprised by the brilliance of her craft, from the spare economy of her prose to the subtle machinations of her plotting to the psychological depth of her characterizations. I went on to reread a lot of her work (though not all of it) and that of her contemporaries. By then, like any writer in love, I had no choice.

And so, Assume Nothing, my new novel, is a love letter to Agatha Christie and her genius. Its central protagonist, Kat McCann, is obsessed with the novels of Dame Carissa Miller — a mystery author who disappears under unusual circumstances — and teams up with the model for Dame Carissa’s quirky, arrogant, morally righteous series detective. Assume Nothing is chock-full of Easter eggs and plot twists and, most of all, affection from this eternally 11-year-old boy to the greatest crime writer of all time.

Joshua Corin is the author of the Xanadu Marx series, the Esme Stuart series, and six Deadpool graphic novels for Marvel Comics, among many others. His work has been translated into over a dozen languages. Joshua currently lives with his cat, Princess Tater Tot, outside of Boston. His new book, Assume Nothing, comes out today from Thomas & Mercer.