Shaitana taunts his suspects with comments that each understands as applying only to them. Poirot's fellow guests include three other crime professionals: secret serviceman Colonel Race, mystery writer Mrs Ariadne Oliver, and Superintendent Battle of Scotland Yard along with four people Shaitana believes to be murderers: Dr Roberts, Mrs Lorrimer, Anne Meredith, and Major Despard. He invites Poirot to a dinner party to meet them. Scoffing at the idea of collecting mere artefacts, Shaitana explains that he collects only the best exhibits: criminals who have evaded justice.

Mr Shaitana, a flamboyant collector, meets Hercule Poirot by chance at an art exhibition and brags about his personal crime-related collection. A later reviewer considered the book to stand at the very top rung of her novels, while another appreciated the brilliant surprise ending. The novel was well received, the critics noting its humour, the subtlety and tightness of the writing, and the good clueing. Identifying the murderer, according to the author, depends wholly on discerning the psychology of the suspects. At the end of the evening, Mr Shaitana is discovered murdered. The four detectives and four possible suspects play bridge after dinner with Mr Shaitana. The book features the recurring characters of Hercule Poirot, Colonel Race, Superintendent Battle, with the crime writer Ariadne Oliver making her first appearance in a Poirot novel. The UK edition retailed at seven shillings and sixpence (7/6) and the US edition at $2.00. Cards on the Table is a detective fiction novel by the English author Agatha Christie, first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club on 2 November 1936 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company the following year.

Poirot by Agatha Christie