Fascinating account of Agatha Christie's participation in a 1922 round-the-world mission to engender enthusiasm for the British Empire Exhibition, a sort of World's Fair of the Empire intended to exploit the raw material wealth of the Colonies, foster trade and open new markets. A not-entirely-seamless mash-up of Christie's original letters and postcards home, photos and newspaper clippings, and diary entries, with each leg of the journey introduced by an excerpt from her autobiography, and the whole bookended by a heart-felt Introduction and Epilogue by Christie's grandson Mathew Prichard. This has its faults, but it's still a fascinating look at the attitudes and reactions of a remarkable woman "before she was famous," as as well as a glimpse of a world that is now gone forever.

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