Agatha Christie(阿加莎·克里斯蒂)is one of the most popular writers of all time. About four billion copies of her books have been sold. And they have been translated into 103 languages. She is often called the queen of the "whodunit". A whodunit is a story that starts with a crime(犯罪), usually murder(凶杀). Then the main character of the story tries to discover who did it (or who-done-it). Readers love Agatha Christie's stories because there are lots of clues and puzzles for them to think about as they read. Her two most famous characters are the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot and the elderly amateur(业余的) detective Miss Marple. Christie always wrote about places that she knew, like Torquay, the English town where she was born in 1890.
Agatha Christie died in 1976 but her books continue to be popular today. For one week every year, lovers of her stories can go to the Agatha Christie Festival in Torquay. People dress up in clothes from the1920s and 1930s, like characters in her stories. Jazz bands play at tea parties and there are dinners on old trains and at old country houses. "Murder" is everywhere, and visitors have a lot of fun trying to discover who the "killer" is—or whodunit.
