History Literature / FiveLittlePigs

* {{Foil}}: Caroline Crale and Elsa Greer. [[spoiler:Caroline has developed into a woman of great conscience and self-sacrificing love, putting up with her husband's dalliances and deliberately taking the fall for a crime she did not commit in order to protect Angela, while Elsa is an egoist whose love is only of the selfish kind with zero consideration of the feelings of others; it leads her to attempt to break up a marriage, and failing that, murder her lover and frame her rival for it. Despite going on to lead a rich and privileged life, Elsa is inwardly dead and has condemned herself to an utterly empty and joyless existence; by contrast, Caroline, despite her outwardly bleak fate of being wrongly condemned and dying in prison, manages to achieve a level of peace and fulfilment she'd never known before.]]

* {{Foil}}: Caroline Crale and Elsa Greer. [[spoiler:Caroline has developed into a woman of great conscience and self-sacrificing love, putting up with her husband's dalliances and deliberately taking the fall for a crime she did not commit in order to protect Angela, while Elsa is an egoist whose love is only of the selfish kind; it leads her to attempt to break up a marriage without a qualm, and failing this, ultimately to murder her lover and frame her rival for it. Despite going on to lead a rich and privileged life, Elsa is inwardly dead and has condemned herself to an utterly empty and joyless existence; by contrast, Caroline, despite her outwardly bleak fate of being wrongly condemned and dying in prison, manages to achieved a level of peace and fulfilment she'd never known before.]]

* {{Foil}}: Caroline Crale and Elsa Greer. [[spoiler:Caroline is a woman of great conscience and self-sacrificing love, putting up with her husband's dalliances and deliberately taking the fall for a crime she did not commit in order to protect Angela, while Elsa is an egoist whose love is only of the selfish kind; it leads her to attempt to break up a marriage without a qualm, and failing this, ultimately to murder her lover and frame her rival for it. Despite going on to lead a rich and privileged life, Elsa is inwardly dead and has condemned herself to an utterly empty and joyless existence; by contrast, Caroline, despite her outwardly bleak fate of being wrongly condemned and dying in prison, manages to achieved a level of peace and fulfilment she'd never known before.]]

* PyrrhicVillainy: [[spoiler:Elsa murders Amyas, lets Caroline take the fall for it, and gets away with everything scot-free. However, by killing her one true love, she condemned herself to a miserable, joyless existence; as she puts it: "I didn’t understand that I was killing ''myself'' — not him." And the brave and noble way Caroline meets her death even serves to thwart any satisfaction Elsa might have otherwise gained from setting her up.]]

* ParentalSubstitute: Shortly after Caroline maimed her half-sister their parents died and Caroline spent the rest of her life avtina the mother and trying to ammend her blinding mistske.

* ShoutOut: The narration mentions "that picture once described by a child as a 'blind girl sitting on an orange and called, I don't know why, "[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hope_(painting) Hope]]"'". The child in question is [[Literature/TheStoryOfTheTreasureSeekers Oswald Bastable]].

* PyrrhicVillainy: [[spoiler:Elsa murders Amyas, lets Caroline take the fall for it, and gets away with everything scot-free. However, by killing her one true love, she condemnded herself to a miserable, joyless existence; as she puts it: "I didn’t understand that I was killing ''myself'' — not him."]]

* GoOutWithASmile: Caroline finally found the peace she had never enjoyed, after [[spoiler:finally atoning for Angela's disfigurement by taking the blame for what she thought was Angela's crime.]]

* ParentsAsPeople: Lampshaded by Poirot when he finds strange that every witness seems to forget that the murder victim has a baby daughter: Miss Williams as the governess discusses it when she explains that middle class children know that their parents love them but are too busy providing for them to pay attention; the love between the affluent murder victim and his wife was so intense that the baby could never have been their first concern.

* PyrrhicVillainy: [[spoiler:Elsa murders Amyas, lets Caroline take the fall for it, and gets away with everything scot-free. However, by killing her one true love, she condemnded herself to a miserable, joyless existence; as she puts it: "I didn’t understand that I was killing ''myself'' — not him.]]

* BettyAndVeronica: Amyas Crale stands in the middle between his long-suffering wife, Caroline and his young, but glamorous, new model, Elsa.

* BrutalHonesty: Caroline Crale believed in this, at least according to her daughter. The reason that Carla believes her mother is innocent is because Caroline sent her a letter saying so, and Caroline never told her daughter comforting lies.

* DeathByWomanScorned: Amyas' womanising ways eventually got him murdered. [[spoiler:Elsa, one of his lovers, genuinely believed his claims when he told her that he would leave his wife for her. Then she overheard the truth, got her heart broken, and killed Amyas in revenge.]]

* DontYouDarePityMe: [[spoiler:Elsa made Caroline the scapegoat for the murder not only out of jealousy, but also because she was furious when she heard Caroline calling out Amyas for the cruel treatment of her (Elsa)]].

* KarmaHoudini: Downplayed. Poirot admits to the killer he has no physical evidence to prove their guilt and they won't publicly confess to it. However, they don't get away consequence-free: [[spoiler:Elsa Greer has never been able to move on from the day she murdered the only man she ever loved. She lives a wealthy but utterly joyless and miserable life. As she puts it "She and Amyas both escaped — they went somewhere where I couldn’t get at them. But they didn’t die. [[FateWorseThanDeath I died."]]]]

* YourCheatingHeart: Amyas Crale had a lot of affairs, despite being married. [[spoiler:However, he only really loved his wife; the rest of the women meant nothing to him. ''Including Elsa.'']]

* UnreliableNarrator: Each guest's account of the events leading up to the death of Amyas Crale is tainted by their own prejudices, things they want to keep hidden, or things they've simply forgotten or don't realize the significance of. For example, one guest casually remarks to Poirot about a minor prank that was once played on Amyas, only to later realize in shock that it was actually something that has occurred on the day of his death and which holds greater significance than anyone could have thought.

* SlapSlapKiss: Amyas and Caroline, constantly. Amyas had affairs and he had very nasty fights with Caroline, but despite this, they were very much in love. According to Angela, they actually enjoyed fighting, and would've found life boring without it. [[spoiler: Amyas never considered leaving Caroline, and she always forgave him.]]

* ReplacementLoveInterest: Justin fell for Caroline in the past, and ends up falling for her daughter Carla in the present. Carla is the splitting image of her mother, and is played by the same actress.

* KarmaHoudini: Downplayed. Poirot admits to the killer he has no physical evidence to prove their guilt and they won't publicly confess to it. However, they don't get away consequence-free: [[spoiler:Elsa Greer has never been able to move on from the day she murdered the only man she ever loved. She lives a wealthy but utterly joyless and miserable life. As she puts it "She and Amyas both escaped — they went somewhere where I couldn’t get at them. But they didn’t die. [[FateWorseThanDeath ''I'' died."]]]]

* KarmaHoudini: Downplayed. Poirot admits to the killer he has no physical evidence to prove their guilt and they won't publicly confess to it. However, they don't get away consequence-free: [[spoiler:Elsa Greer has never been able to move on from the day she murdered the only man she ever loved. She lives a wealthy but utterly joyless and miserable life. As she puts it [[FateWorseThanDeath "I died that day."]]]]

* ClingyJealousGirl: Gender-inverted with Amyas. The infamous rows between the couple were mostly not caused because of Amyas' frequent flings with other women, but because he was jealous that Caroline seemed to prioritise her sister Angela over him.

* AdaptationalBadass: Carla is even more active and determined in the play than in the original story; she goes herself to visit the five suspects, and ends up figuring our part of the mystery on her own (specifically, about Angela's part in it).

The story was featured in the ninth series of ''Series/{{Poirot}}'' in 2003. Tropes concerning the TV adaptation are listed on the series page.

** Both the Blake brothers in love with Caroline, and neither ever marries, even after her death. [[spoiler: And Meredith has grown to harbour the same feelings for Elsa.]]

* NiceJobBreakingItHero: Both Caroline and Miss Williams tried to protect someone in the name of what they thought was justice, but their lies caused the actual murderer, whom neither of them would want to shield, to get away with what they'd done.

* ParentsAsPeople: Lampshaded by Poirot when he finds strange that every witness seems to forget that the murder victim has a baby daughter: Miss Williams as the governess discusses it when she explains that middle class children know that their parents love them but are too busy providing for them to pay attention; the love between the affluent murder victim and his wife was so intense that the baby could never have been their first concern.