Listen free for 30 days

Listen with offer

Offer ends May 1st, 2024 11:59PM GMT. Terms and conditions apply.
£7.99/month after 3 months. Renews automatically.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
The Floating Admiral cover art

The Floating Admiral

By: Agatha Christie,Simon Brett - preface,Dorothy L. Sayers - introduction,G. K. Chesterton - prologue
Narrated by: David Timson
Get this deal Try for £0.00

Pay £99p/month. After 3 months pay £7.99/month. Renews automatically. See terms for eligibility.

£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Buy Now for £13.00

Buy Now for £13.00

Pay using card ending in
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.

Listeners also enjoyed...

Mrs Pargeter's Principle cover art
Bodies from the Library cover art
The Secret of Chimneys cover art
The Petaybee Trilogy cover art
Hyperion cover art
The Scarlet Letter cover art
A Feast of Carrion cover art
Inspector French’s Greatest Case cover art
No Rest for the Dead cover art
The Cornish Coast Murder cover art
The Groote Park Murder cover art
Footsteps in the Dark cover art
Betrayal cover art
The Paddington Mystery cover art
These Names Make Clues cover art
The Crime at Black Dudley cover art

Summary

Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, G.K. Chesterton and nine other writers from the legendary Detection Club collaborate in this fiendishly clever but forgotten crime novel first published 80 years ago.

Inspector Rudge does not encounter many cases of murder in the sleepy seaside town of Whynmouth. But when an old sailor lands a rowing boat containing a fresh corpse with a stab wound to the chest, the Inspector's investigation immediately comes up against several obstacles. The vicar, whose boat the body was found in, is clearly withholding information, and the victim's niece has disappeared. There is clearly more to this case than meets the eye – even the identity of the victim is called into doubt. Inspector Rudge begins to wonder just how many people have contributed to this extraordinary crime and whether he will ever unravel it…

In 1931, Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers and ten other crime writers from the newly-formed ‘Detection Club’ collaborated in publishing a unique crime novel. In a literary game of consequences, each author would write one chapter, leaving G.K. Chesterton to write a typically paradoxical prologue and Anthony Berkeley to tie up all the loose ends. In addition, each of the authors provided their own solution in a sealed envelope, all of which appeared at the end of the book, with Agatha Christie’s ingenious conclusion acknowledged at the time to be ‘enough to make the book worth buying on its own’.

The authors of this novel are: G. K. Chesterton, Canon Victor Whitechurch, G. D. H. Cole and Margaret Cole, Henry Wade, Agatha Christie, John Rhode, Milward Kennedy, Dorothy L. Sayers, Ronald Knox, Freeman Wills Crofts, Edgar Jepson, Clemence Dane and Anthony Berkeley.

©1931, 2011 The Detection Club (P)2017 HarperCollins Publishers

Critic reviews

"The plotting is ingenious, the pace sustained, the solution satisfying." (The New York Times Book Review)

"Amazingly, the story steers along very well despite so many different hands at the tiller. Christie's solution is typically ingenious." (Mark Campbell, The Pocket Essential Agatha Christie)

"These members of the Detection Club collaborate with skill in a piece of detection rather more tight-knit than one had a right to expect. There is enough to amuse and to stimulate detection; and the Introduction by Dorothy Sayers and supplements by critics and solvers give an insight into the writers' thoughts and modes of work." (Jacques Barzun and Wendell Hertig Taylor, A Catalogue of Crime)

What listeners say about The Floating Admiral

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    49
  • 4 Stars
    34
  • 3 Stars
    40
  • 2 Stars
    12
  • 1 Stars
    5
Performance
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    66
  • 4 Stars
    35
  • 3 Stars
    18
  • 2 Stars
    3
  • 1 Stars
    3
Story
  • 3.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    46
  • 4 Stars
    22
  • 3 Stars
    36
  • 2 Stars
    14
  • 1 Stars
    6

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

Sort by:
Filter by:
  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Tightly crafted mystery

Unless you are a reincarnation of Agatha Christie, I doubt you will find the answer to this puzzle. Even then, it could be difficult.

The Detection Club got together and wrote this book, each author contributing a chapter and, in some cases, a sealed solution for when the book was finished.

Considering it is written by a lot of authors with usually very varied styles, they manage to create a book that flows nicely, although I did start to get tired of all the red herrings and odd clues that kept turning up. I did honestly try to solve this but it was beyond my capabilities. A lot of fun though!

By the end I was totally confused as to whodunit but Anthony Berkeley does a very credible job of stitching the whole thing together with some degree of believability.

Full marks to all the authors and full marks to the narrator, who did a very good job on this book.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

18 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

great crime

the detection club strikes again, the greatest writers of a truly unique club. more please

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

4 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

it was awful

What disappointed you about The Floating Admiral?

It was awful. You could tell it was written by different authors. Each chapter was like a new book but not in a good way. I didn't get a feel for the caractures or plot. Hated it. So long and drawn out. Tedious is the word for it.
..

Would you ever listen to anything by the authors again?

Nop

How did the narrator detract from the book?

Ok

What reaction did this book spark in you? Anger, sadness, disappointment?

Utter disappointment

Any additional comments?

No

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Average

Unfortunately the story is constrained by each author trying to write their way out of the previous chapter. It therefore gets bogged down. The solutions are also less interesting than In I’d expected. Worth a listen as a curio but not essential.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

inconsistent, very mixed styles from the different

Inconsistent, very mixed styles from the different authors. confusing plot. Good effort from the narrator!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Who did it?

Very interesting. Fascinating to read each chapter written by a different detective writer. I did not expect the ending.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

Disjointed

I found the beginning of the book held the story together but was not enjoying it for chapters 16, 17 and 18

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

Excellent and interesting trying to spot the joins

Greatly enjoyed this not just for the story - which is as usual for classic crime writers full of interesting characters and plausible reasons for murder - but also for the intrigue of spotting the different parts of the plot as a 'who wrote which' - although the introduction does indicate this so perhaps best till last for people that prefer to read not knowing storyline in advance - although I felt it actually added to my enjoyment.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    4 out of 5 stars

unusual format

an enjoyable story. the solutions offered at the end of the book allow you to choose the solution that sits best with you or come up with your own solution

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    3 out of 5 stars

A good listen

Very interesting story showing how separate authors can conspire together but write apart to produce an excellent story.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!