Some guests are invited to a lonely mansion on Indian Island by a host who, surprisingly, fails to appear. First there were ten, each with something to hide and something to fear. On the island they are cut off from everything but each other and the inescapable shadows of their own past lives. One by one, the guests share the darkest secrets of their wicked pasts and, one by one, they die. This is considered by many readers the best mystery novel ever written.