Want to join the Eat My News's global community? Here is an opportunity to join the Board of Young Leaders Program by Eat My News. Click here to know more: bit.ly/boardofyoungleaders
The novel was released in the year 1967 and was finished by the author in a record time of just six weeks. The title of the story comes from William Blake’s Auguries of Innocence: Every night and every morn,
Some to misery are born,
Every morn and every night,
Some are born to sweet delight,
Some are born to endless night.
Introduction of The Characters
The protagonist of the novel is Micheal Rogers, a footloose, seemingly nonchalant, working-class dabbler who narrates the story. He starts as a charmer. The story begins with Michael Rogers telling us about his time as a chauffeur and how he met the famous architect Rudolph Santonix. He aspires to have a house built by Santonix in the future.
One day while going around the infamous Gypsy's acre he comes across a wealthy heiress, Ellie who wants to escape from her world of snobby friends, begging relatives, and restrictive financial advisors. After their marriage, Micheal gets to know that Ellie had already bought the Gypsy's acre and they decide to get Santonix to build a house for them. As the newlyweds stay in the house, Ellie gets a warning from Ms Lee saying that the acre is cursed and that they should leave immediately.
Soon after, Ellie gets injured and invites her companion Greta Anderson to stay with them. Then begin a series of incidents which tense Ellie but they continue their stay. One day while at lunch Micheal gets worried that Ellie hasn't come yet and they go looking for her only to find her dead but he notes that she has no sustained injuries. The local police conclude that she has died of shock.
The Final Blow
Amidst all this commotion, Micheal attends Ellie's funeral in America and inherits all her wealth and returns to the UK on a sea voyage to retrospect the happenings. After returning, Micheal explains everything that had occurred right from having met Greta much earlier in Germany, having fallen in love with her but not having any money to start a life together, how they had plotted against Ellie to inherit her all of her property, about how they killed her using cyanide and used Ms Lee as the reason for the shock. Soon after, he kills Ms Lee and also another of Ellie's friends Claudia who had known the plot. He and Greta celebrate what they have done, but Michael starts to lapse and sees Ellie everywhere he looks. When Greta starts to realize what they have done, Michael doesn’t spare her either and strangles her. The final nail in the coffin is when the police catch Michael at which point he reminisces about all of the bad things he has done, such as drowning his childhood friend to steal his watch. Micheal asks for a pen and paper to write down his story, and the novel ends.
The Conclusion
This is a chilling stand-alone novel by Agatha Christie. Endless Night is quite different from Agatha Christie's Poirot or Marple series. The author’s depiction of the downfall of an optimistic young couple who ignored the warnings of a gypsy and built a dream home on an allegedly cursed island is exemplary, especially as presented here, as a way to escape from the world, to hole up with someone who loves you in a house you have designed by a genius architect. It feels like a fairytale.
The beginning is extremely slow and the reader has to make efforts to stay glued but as the story progresses to the death of Ellie, that's when the story becomes interesting and the author's brilliance kicks in. The reader will fall in love with the protagonist's character and will never be even able to wildly guess that Micheal is the real culprit. You would love being inside his head. Also, the way she has portrayed the rest of the characters is incredible - all through Micheal's thoughts and feelings. She takes us on a rollercoaster ride, making us hate certain characters we probably should have paid more attention to, and making us suspicious of others who weren't even an important part in the plot (or so we think). The greatest quality of Agatha Christie's writing is that she makes our senses deceive us and this book is no different. A must-read and after reading this book we can imagine the faint laughter of Agatha Christie after she successfully makes a mockery of our senses.
Written By: Jeevana Allu
Edited By: Harshit Agarwal
Social