The Mysterious Affair at Styles Themes

The Mysterious Affair at Styles centers around the murder of Emily Inglethorp, but the novel is really about the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot and his incredible powers of deduction. The murder takes place quite early in the novel, and Poirot spends the rest of the book piecing together what happened. His willingness to pay close attention to each and every aspect of the case ultimately suggests that successful detective work requires fastidious organization, extreme…

At first glance, The Mysterious Affair at Styles might not seem like a book about romance, but the vast majority of the characters are ultimately driven by love or desire. Like many works of detective fiction, the novel throws suspicion on almost all of its characters, casting doubt on everyone from the victim’s stepsons to a young woman the victim herself took into her home. Although all of Emily Inglethorp’s potential murderers attract suspicion…

The Mysterious Affair at Styles demonstrates the many ways in which wealth can complicate life and put a strain on personal relationships. As a wealthy woman, Emily Inglethorp appears to be aware of the power she holds over people because of her money, and though she makes a show of devoting herself to charity, she also seems to curry favor with people by indicating that she’ll look after them financially. When she takes a young…