Skip to main content
PBS logo
 
 

Book Review of The Grand Tour: Letters and Photographs from the British Empire Expedition 1922

The Grand Tour: Letters and Photographs from the British Empire Expedition 1922
maura853 avatar reviewed on + 542 more book reviews


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.