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The Royal Mint in collaboration with Agatha Christie Limited is celebrating &lsquo100 years of Mystery&rsquo with a new commemorative £2 coin in recognition of Agatha Christie&rsquos vast body of work which is widely renowned for shaping the modern mystery genre. Since that first book, the Queen of Crime went on to be published in more than 50 languages and her works were distributed in more than 100 countries.
The coin coincides with the centenary of the writer&rsquos first novel, The Mysterious Affair At Styles which introduced detective Hercule Poirot to the world in October 1920.
It features a jigsaw design, comes in various metals, and is available on the Royal Mint's website, priced from £10 to £1,115.
David Lawrence, coin&rsquos designer says, &ldquothe jigsaw turned out to be the best metaphor for an Agatha Christie mystery It is not until the final missing piece is dropped into a place that the whole picture can be seen.&rdquo
According to the Royal Mint, the coin featuring jigsaw pieces and replication of Christie's signature, will not be released into general circulation. The coin's edge is inscribed with the phrase 'Little Grey Cells', first used by her famous Belgian detective, Hercule Poirot, in the debut novel.
Clare Maclennan, divisional director of commemorative coins at the Royal Mint, said, &ldquothe coin's design is adorned with all the hallmarks of an Agatha Christie novel, with the jigsaw pieces representing ingenious plot twists that we are all familiar with when reading her mystery novels."
Her first novel ushered in a golden age of mystery novels in its time and her subsequent works have built a huge collection of celebrated spin-offs from TV shows to films for generations. Many well-known actors have featured in them, from Benedict Cumberbatch and Penélope Cruz to Willem Dafoe, Judi Dench and Johny Depp.
Meanwhile, the popularity of Christie's work continues unabated. Watch out for the star-studded film version of another Poirot tale, Death On The Nile, which is set to be released by November 2020. This will be the second Christie film (after Murder On The Orient Express) where Kenneth Branagh plays the eccentric detective with the egg-shaped head and waxed moustache.
