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The first mystery book to use the "detective gathers the suspects and lays out what happened and who did it" plot device was Agatha Christie's The Murder of Roger Ackroyd. The book, published in 1926, was an instant bestseller and is still considered one of Christie's best works. In the book, Hercule Poirot is called in to solve the murder of wealthy businessman Roger Ackroyd. However, instead of investigating the crime scene, Poirot uses his deductive skills to piece together what happened by interviewing the suspects. By the end of the book, all of the pieces come together and the murderer is revealed. While other mystery novels had used similar plot devices before, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd was the first to bring all of the elements together in such a memorable way. Christie's novel set a new standard for mystery fiction and remains an influential work in the genre today.
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