Agatha Christie’s 1939 novel, And Then There Were None, revolves around ten strangers who are invited to a private island off the Devonshire coast for the weekend by a mysterious man named U.N. Owen. Upon arrival, their host is nowhere to be found, but after a recording is played at dinner accusing all the guests of murder and the subsequent mysterious deaths of the guests, the few remaining believe that not only is U.N. Owen the person killing them off, but that U.N. Owen is in fact one of them. Unfortunately, even though the characters attempt to discover who U.N. Owen really is, by the time a boat arrives to pick them up at the end of the weekend, all ten guests are dead. This level of ongoing uncertainty, mixed with the rapid death toll of characters in the novel, is eerily reminiscent to the overall tone of 2020—which is a significant reason for why this would be a relevant book to read currently.

        The all too familiar feeling of uncertainty is something in which Christie excels—creating a plot for which any reader’s effort to identify the killer are foiled, when she reveals the killer’s identity. Christie’s keen ability to keep the plot moving at a swift pace makes the storyline feel alive, never seeming to drag on for too long. The combination of the fast-paced murders and how they follow in accordance to an old nursery rhyme called “Ten Little Indians,” gives a level of suspense to the reader that keeps them engaged, making it painfully difficult to put the book down at times.

        In a year like 2020, it has become nearly impossible not to incorporate and compare the COVID-19 pandemic to our daily lives—including the entertainment we choose to indulge in. While this novel doesn’t revolve around a pandemic—and instead an unknown murderer seeking justice through the massacre of their guests—it shares common themes of death, fear, and the unknown that the world is currently facing. One could even argue that the rapid deaths of the characters is akin to the seemingly overnight spread of COVID-19, where the mass loss of lives has been consistent for months. These mass deaths, both in the novel and through the pandemic, evoke feelings of fear and uncertainty towards the future. Realistically, readers cannot escape their fears that the pandemic has provided. However, Christie helps temporarily ease their fears by implementing them in a place where it cannot directly affect the reader.

        Overall, this work by Agatha Christie is a prime example of what a quality mystery novel should be—having the ability to remain relevant to modern times, even eighty-one years after its release.  In a time like this, where people are forced to indefinitely accept the unknown, this novel is oddly relatable to readers, while at the same time creating an outlet for them to take their minds off of 2020 and onto the island off the Devonshire coast.