Sophie Hannah Quotes

I have never been able to read Agatha Christie - the pleasure is purely in the puzzle, and the reader is toyed with by someone who didn't decide herself who the killer was until the end of the writing.

The first proper mystery novel that I read was 'Murder On the Orient Express' with a gaunt David Niven and a cherubic Peter Ustinov on the cover. 'Orient Express,' you'll recall, is the one where everyone did it, which delighted me no end, and I was immediately hooked.

I've always been a secret locked-room fanatic. I read my first one when I was about ten or 11, Agatha Christie's 'Murder on the Orient Express,' with David Niven and Peter Ustinov on the cover.

The queen of crime, Agatha Christie, was always more concerned about the clockwork cleverness of the plot, never the investigator.

I had thought for years, probably 30 or 40 years, that it would be a lot of fun to try my hand at a classic English mystery novel... I love that form very much because the reader is so familiar with all of the types of characters that are in there that they already identify with the book.

I've been in an Agatha Christie called 'The Sittaford Mystery,' which I enjoyed, but 'The Pale Horse' has a real sense of intrigue and the jigsaw pieces fitting together.

One little Indian boy left all alone; He went and hanged himself and then there were none.

I like murder mysteries, the Agatha Christie kinds of things where you know that it's all going to be neatly wound up at the end.

My dad says I was an extra in 'Die Hard.' I think it's true.

I didn't watch a Test match live until I played in my first in 2003.

I have always loved the big stage and would often tell my friends while growing up that I'd want to help India win the World Cup one day.

To buy books would be a good thing if we also could buy the time to read them.

I wish I'd done better for England. I only played three Tests and three One Day internationals. You have to take your chances and, for whatever reason, I didn't.

I've never been a great fan of crime fiction. I read Agatha Christie in my youth, but that's all.

My maternal grandmother would sit, before binge-watching existed, and watch 'Poirot' until the cows came home. You couldn't pull her away from it.

My father had always hoped that one day I would be a great cricketer, captaining the Stowe Eleven, perhaps, or even playing for Cambridge.

I'd always had this romantic idea, ever since I've been writing scripts, that I would travel one day and pull up stumps, as we say in Australia. It's a cricket reference. You can Google it. Pull up stumps in some country like Italy or Spain and do my little Truman Capote thing.

Sue Grafton's 'A Is for Alibi', the 1982 novel that introduced the world to private detective Kinsey Millhone, wasn't seen as the pioneering achievement we now know it to be.

I love David Suchet. I'm obsessed with Poirot. Then I saw him in 'The Importance of Being Earnest,' where he did Lady Bracknell, and he was amazing - he did it like a dinosaur, like a velociraptor.

I absolutely adore classic crime and read a huge amount as a teen - Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, Sherlock Holmes, Josephine Tey, and many more.

We're so used to seeing Agatha Christie's work on screen that going back to the original is a real joy.

Any given day, you'll find me at secondhand bookstores.

One of the defining moments in my life was when I had the privilege to speak to him over the phone. I couldn't say anything - I was tongue tied. I just cried out of sheer happiness. That day I made a promise to myself; One day I will play for Sachin's team- I'll play for team India.

People think of me as well-travelled, but I had not been out of Pakistan until I was picked in the Under-19 squad in 1997. The flight went from Lahore to Karachi and then from Karachi to South Africa. It was my first time on a plane and my first trip overseas.

My dad's an amazing photographer, and he loves a Sunday market. So the house was full of all the stuff he'd buy, and frame.