Miss Marple Morton adapted the novel for the stage, he replaced the character of Caroline with a young girl. This change saddened Christie and she determined to give old maids a voice: Miss Marple was born. Christie may have taken the name from Marple railway station, through which she passed, or from Marple Hall, near her sister Madge's home at Abney Hall. The character of Jane Marple in the first Miss Marple book, "The Murder at the Vicarage", is markedly different from how she appears in later books. This early version of Miss Marple is a gleeful gossip and not an especially
The Murder at the Vicarage stories would later appear in book form in "The Thirteen Problems" in 1932. In St. Mary Mead, no one is more despised than Colonel Lucius Protheroe. Even the local vicar has said that killing him would be doing a service to the townsfolk. So when Protheroe is found murdered in the same vicar's study, and two different people confess to the crime, it is time for the elderly spinster Jane Marple to exercise her detecting abilities. According to Miss Marple, there are seven suspects, including the Vicar himself. After some juggling of clues and events, Miss Marple, using her excellent