Murder Isn''t Easy: The Forensics of Agatha Christie

While other children were devouring the works of Enid Blyton and Beatrix Potter, Carla Valentine was poring through the pages of Agatha Christie novels. It was this early fascination that led to her job as a pathology technician, trained in forensics and working in mortuaries.

Nearly every Agatha Christie story involves one - or, more commonly, several - dead bodies, and for a young Carla, a curious child already fascinated with biology, these stories and these bodies were perfect puzzles.

Of course, Agatha herself didn''t talk of ''forensics'' in the way we use it now, but in each tale she writes of twists and turns with her expert weave of human observation, ingenuity and genuine science of the era. Through the medium of the ''whodunnit'', Agatha Christie was a pioneer of forensic science, and in Murder Isn''t Easy Carla illuminates all of the knowledge of one of our most beloved authors.