Taken at the Flood

Name: Taken at the Flood
Rating: 4.07 (31427 reviews)
Author: Agatha Christie

Hercule Poirot • Book 27

by Agatha Christie

Narrated by Hugh Fraser

4.07 ABR Score (31.4K ratings)

★ 3.75 Goodreads (30.7K) ★ 4.56 Audible (729)

6h 17m Released 2012 Mystery

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Why Listen to This Audiobook?

Christie buries the real mystery so deep you won't realize you've been misreading the whole case until Poirot does.

Great if you want: Christie at her most psychologically twisted, not just puzzle-driven
Listening experience: slow build with a payoff that reframes everything before it
Narration: Fraser's Poirot is lived-in and dry — perfectly understated
Skip if: you prefer Christie's tighter, faster-paced village mysteries

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About This Audiobook

Gordon Cloade marries late and dies badly, killed in the London Blitz just weeks after his wedding, leaving his widow in sole possession of a fortune his extended family had long expected to share. When Hercule Poirot is approached by a spirit-guided sister-in-law who believes the widow's first husband may still be alive, he is drawn into a case whose real motivations are far more human and far more dangerous than anything a medium could conjure. Agatha Christie's Taken at the Flood is one of her bleakest post-war novels, steeped in the social dislocation and moral fatigue of the period.

Hugh Fraser's delivery brings both the era and the character to life with practiced ease. His Poirot is subtle rather than flamboyant, letting the Belgian's ironic intelligence surface through tone and timing rather than accent theatrics. The intimate scale of the production, just over six hours, suits a mystery that operates more through psychological unease than plot machinery, and Fraser sustains the atmospheric tension throughout.