Second in the Malabar Hall series by the author, The Dying Day is a historical mystery featuring the (fictional) first female police inspector in India Persis Wadia. My thanks to Hodder and Stoughton and NetGalley for a review copy of this book. Many thanks to the publisher for an ARC.more This is turning out to be a wonderfully engaging and atmospheric historical series that I strongly recommend to both historical fiction fans and crime and mystery readers. His central protagonist, the flawed and prickly Persis Wadia, feels like an authentic creation, having to constantly battle misogyny and a male world that would diminish and make invisible her achievements, she is a loner, much like Healy, whose past is slowly revealed in the book. His research of this period is impeccable, making this fascinating and colourful period of history come vibrantly alive, the mix of cultures and religion, along with the social norms and attitudes of the time. Khan evokes a post-war India that is finding its feet, reconfiguring a new relationship with a Britain who is in the throes of losing its empire. She has a second case, her boss, Roshan Seth has appointed George Fernandes as lead, who she is still furious with after he had betrayed her, leading to a fraught and awkward joint investigation of a murdered white woman left on the tracks. She finds herself following a trail of cryptic clues and riddles left behind by Healy, leading to the manuscript, which seems strange given that he had taken it. There are political implications, putting Wadia under pressure to find Healy and recover the valuable manuscript for which Mussolini had offered £1 million pounds but had been rebuffed.
After WW2, India has undergone the horrors of partition that followed independence from Britain.Īt the Bombay Royal Asiatic Society at Horniman Circle, a priceless copy of Dante's Divine Comedy has gone missing, assumed to be stolen by their celebrated British Curator of Manuscripts who has gone missing at the same time, John Healy, a survivor from a prisoner of war camp in WW2, a traumatic experience that left him a changed man. She is shying away from acknowledging the feelings she has for Archie Blackfinch, the English forensic scientist she works with, facing warnings from her family about becoming involved with a white British man, particularly given her high profile position. She would rather just get on with her job which is her sole focus, she is not always a likeable personality, she is socially awkward, charmless, stubborn, feeling she has to constantly prove herself, and not at ease when it comes to her personal life, particularly as she had been betrayed the one time she had been in love. Her fame has grown at a national level after events from the previous book, putting her under an uncomfortable spotlight, pushing her as a role model she is not keen to be, whilst at the same time derided for doing what is perceived as a man's job. She would rather just get on with her job w This is the second in Vaseem Khan's historical Malabar House crime fiction series, set in India in 1950, featuring the now famous ambitious Parsee Inspector Persis Wadia, India's first female police officer.
This is the second in Vaseem Khan's historical Malabar House crime fiction series, set in India in 1950, featuring the now famous ambitious Parsee Inspector Persis Wadia, India's first female police officer. Tasked to recover an item for which Benito Mussolini once offered one million pounds, Persis soon uncovers a series of murders, and a trail of tantalising coded clues that lead her into the dark heart of conspiracy. The society's preeminent treasure, a priceless manuscript of Dante's Divine Comedy, has vanished, as has the society's head curator, William Huxley, an Englishman with a passion for Indian history. India's first female police detective, Persis Wadia, is summoned to the 150-year-old Bombay Royal Asiatic Society at Horniman Circle. Persis must solve the riddle to find the killer - or die trying. The society's preeminent treasure, a priceless manuscript of Dante's Divine Comedy, has vanished, as has the society's head A murdered man. Bombay, 1950 India's first female police detective, Persis Wadia, is summoned to the 150-year-old Bombay Royal Asiatic Society at Horniman Circle.