Agatha Christie is the world’s bestselling fiction author and the world’s most-translated author, with over two billion of her books sold worldwide. Now, a century after the publication of her first book and nearly fifty years after her death, her books are still selling millions of copies around the globe, her play “The Mousetrap” is still setting records as the world’s longest continuously-running play, “And Then There Were None” is still the world’s bestselling crime novel over eighty years after its release, her stage plays are being performed all over the world, and film and television adaptations of her work are still being produced.

It’s a common axiom in the publishing industry that once the author dies, the work dies. There are many hugely popular writers in the mystery, science fiction, romance, and western genres who are completely forgotten today, with their books out of print aside from a few titles released by small specialty publishers. Many popular authors published dozens of books during their lifetimes, with hardly any being available to readers today. Yet all of Christie’s sixty-six crime novels have been continuously in print ever since their releases, produced by a major publisher.

Part of this is due to Agatha Christie Ltd., the company formed during Christie’s lifetime, which oversees her legacy and keeps her work in the public eye. While other writers fade into obscurity, Agatha Christie and Agatha Christie Ltd. are still going strong.