British · 1890–1976
English mystery writer whose sales exceed two billion copies. Born in Devon, she published her first Poirot novel in 1920 and kept writing until her death fifty-six years later. Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple became the genre's most recognizable detectives. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd pioneered a narrative trick that still shocks first-time readers. And Then There Were None remains the bestselling mystery novel ever. Her plays, especially The Mousetrap, run for decades. She shaped reader expectations so thoroughly that her tricks became the form's conventions.