Agatha Christie is the most widely published author of all time, in any language, outsold only by the Bible and Shakespeare. The author of eighty crime novels and short story collections, her books have sold more than two billion copies worldwide.Now, in the first novel to appear since 1976, perhaps her most famous and beloved detective, Hercule Poirot, returns to bring his "little grey cells" to bear on one last case. In Spring of 1934, Poirot is summoned to Surrey, by England's most prominent physicist, Sir Claud Amory. Amory fears that someone in his household is attempting to steal his latest discovery, a formula critical to England's defense. Poirot, with Captain Hastings at his side, rushes to Surrey, but arrives too late. Amory has died, his formula is missing, and anyone in his country house, full of relatives and guests, could have been responsible.

Originally written in 1930 as a three act play, Black Coffee has never before been published in a trade edition. Adapted as a novel by Charles Osborne (Christie's biographer and well-known theater and opera critic), Black Coffee is classic Christie at her finest.