CHRISTIE, Agatha (1890-1976). Curtain: Poirot’s Last Case. London: Collins, 1975.

First edition in an excellent dust-jacket. Presentation copy, signed by the author in a frail hand for her secretary, amanuensis and close friend Charlotte 'Carlo' Fisher. This book published in September 1975 was the last published during Christie’s lifetime and this copy must be one of the last few books signed by Christie before her death on the 12 January 1976. 'Collins approached Christie for permission to published one of the two books she had written during the Blitz and kept aside as a legacy for her daughter Rosalind. After some resistance, William Collins persuaded Christie that she should have the last word with Poirot' (Wagstaff and Poole).

Octavo. Original black boards, spine lettered in silver (edges faintly spotted); original dust-jacket supplied from another copy (a little nicked and creased at edges, slightly marked and rubbed). Provenance: Charlotte 'Carlo' Fisher (1895-1976, secretary, amanuensis and close friend of Agatha Christie; signed by the author on front free endpaper, and with Fisher’s posthumous book label).