There is nothing more thrilling in this world, I think, than having a child that is yours, and yet is mysteriously a stranger - Agatha Christie

Juan Osborne Words That Kill

Agatha Christie’s father died when she was eleven years old. 

Her mother taught her at home, encouraging her to write at a very young age. 

At the age of 16, she went to Mrs Dryden's finishing school in Paris 

to study singing and piano.

Despite a turbulent courtship,  Agatha married Colonel Archibald Christie,

an aviator in the Royal Flying Corps, on Christmas Eve 1914.   The couple had one daughter, Rosalind Hicks.  Agatha's first novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, was published in 1920.  

When Archie was offered a job organizing a world tour to promote the British Empire Exhibition 

the couple left their daughter with Agatha's mother and sister and travelled to South Africa, 

Australia, New Zealand  and Hawaii.  They learned to surf prone in South Africa and Waikiki

and became some of the first Britons to surf standing up.

Agatha the wave-rider

 

Agatha with daughter and only child, Rosalind

 

Rosalind with only child, Matthew

Agatha and grandson Matthew

In 1930, Christie married the archaeologist Sir Max Mallowan. Mallowan
was 14 years younger than Christie, and a Roman Catholic, while she 

was of the Anglican faith. Their marriage was happy in the early years, 

and endured despite Mallowan's many affairs in later life, notably with 

Barbara Parker, whom he married in 1977, the year after Christie's death.

Nimrud Ivories

Agatha Christie died on 12 January 1976, at age 85, from natural causes, 

at Winterbrook House in the north of Cholsey parish, 

adjoining Wallingford in Oxfordshire (formerly Berkshire).