THE PALE HORSE. By Agatha Christie

This is certainly a work that an African reader (like myself) will find fascinating and highly gripping. However the conclusion here would shatter what the likes of me would have hitherto been led to believe: so a white, western writer can write so convincingly about the true powers of “juju” (occult) !Agatha Christie is (was) of course a down to earth western writer, and at the end she coolly and rationally explains the events of this work which one could have sworn could only have been due to supernatural means. Hence I find this work instructive and relevant to we Africans, no matter how educated, who even till date tend to “explain” simple occurrences like footballing skill, talent, results; and even illnesses/ailments – by strongly alluding to the occult and the supernatural.