Product Description

Constructed around the true Nanavati murder case, Indra Sinha's first novel offers a rare and fascinating insight into the psychosexual undercurrents of Indian life. In a family of storytellers, there was one tale never told...The reverberations from the notorious Nanavati society murder in 1950s Bombay - involving a love triangle between an Indian playboy, an Englishwoman and her jealous Indian husband - were so great they reached the offices of Prime Minister Nehru. What is not known is that a second, connected crime, so cruel that it destroyed the lives of two women, went unreported and has remained unpunished. Until now. In present-day London the women's children meet. Driven by grief and anger they return to India to uncover the mystery of the crime that caused their mothers' suffering and exact their cold revenge. But in the bazaars of today's Bombay, a city racked and burned by riots, their adversary still enjoys huge power, and the friends soon find themselves in real, terrifying danger.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #172952 in Books
• Published on: 2003-06-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 592 pages

Review
India did it to Vikram Seth, it did it to Paul Scott and Salman Rushdie, and now it's done it to Indra Sinha. Maybe it's the very size of the subcontinent that inspires writers to produce novels of such stupefying length that the reader can feel more than a little overwhelmed at the vast store of ever-accumulating facts he has to carry in his head to extract the full value from a book like this one. There's a first-class story here, but it's tricked out with so much unessential ornament and bits of exotic fluff (all of it beautifully written, it must be said) that the plotline sometimes threatens to sink beneath all the extraneous weight. The novel is dense, intricate and fascinating, alternating between well-to-do Indian life in the 1950s and present-day provincial Sussex. It largely deals with the murder of a mysterious Asian Lothario (the Mister Love of the title) that happens in the hero's childhood, and his subsequent discovery of the enigma surrounding it begins to obsess his adult existence years later when he's running a second-hand bookshop in Lewes. Yet once these slightly shaky premises are established, the narrative of the Indian boy's idyllic childhood is enchanting. Indeed, Sinha sometimes seems more of a poet than a narrator; his description of the arrival of the rains after the dry season, for example, is quite superb: 'The first heavy drop will hit the earth. Another drop. Another. Stamping the dust with leopard spots. The earth will sigh in relief, exhaling a strong mineral-and-herb-scented breath.' This is a splendid book, but needs close attention to give of its best. (Kirkus UK)

A masterfully told story of an old murder with a long reach moves seamlessly from the past to the present, from India to England, as a middle-aged Indian tries to learn the truth about his mother and a friend's past. Now based in England, the Indian-born Sinha (The Cybergypsies: A True Tale of Lust, War, and Betrayal on the Electronic Frontier, 1999) memorably evokes the contrasting textures of both societies in a first novel ostensibly about a true crime in 1950s Bombay-but in fact more about his protagonist's own life. It's 1998, and narrator Bhalu, a bookseller in Lewes, is summoned to London by his 76-year-old mother, Maya, who tells him she's dying. In Bombay, Maya had been a noted storyteller and scriptwriter for the film industry; but as a young student, Bhalu was arrested in a police raid, and once Maya secured his release, sent him to England, shortly following there herself. Now, Maya, who believes that lives are continually unfolding and that stories never really end, claims she left India for Bhalu's sake. Their leaving seems also strangely connected to the murder of one "Mr. Love," a famous Bombay philanderer. Recalling his childhood in Bombay and the Amborna Hills, where he first met English Phoebe and her mother Sybil, a close friend of Maya's, Bhalu also ruefully details his failures as a husband and as a filmmaker. Back in India he and Phoebe were close childhood friends who would explore the local countryside while Maya helped Sybil recover from an unspecified illness. Later, after Maya's death, Bhalu learns real story about Sybil when Phoebe, unmarried and curiously elusive, contacts him suggesting that he read Sybil's notebooks. From them he learns of Sybil's affair with "Mr. Love," her botched abortion, and the mysterious blackmailer who not only destroyed Sybil but also drove Maya and Bhalu to England. Returning to India to track down the blackmailer, Bhalu will finally understand both his own past, as well his mother's and Sybil's. A stylish, page-turning debut. (Kirkus Reviews)

Observer
'Sinha is an elegant writer, and his novel twinkles with genial intelligence'

Daily Mail
'This big, highly sophisticated novel [is a] brilliant insider-outsider account of India'

Customer Reviews

The Death of Mr Love
I was very gripped by the narrative until about two thirds of the way through the book. Then I felt Sinha began to struggle to keep his plot alive. Nonetheless it was an enjoyable read, the story weaving skilfully between 1950's Bombay, and 1999 England and Bombay. Bhalu, the central figure, is well characterised, and Phoebe is enigmatic to the end. Best of all are the descriptions of India, and accounts of the political tensions.

Love, Doubt, Betrayal. Void
One death, long ago, stains the innocence of the present with the pus of ancient corruption. It is a search for truth, rather than revenge, that drives the story, but it proves to be a truth that brings no release. India is evoked with astonishing richness and depth, while remaing a backdrop for the characters, who are vivid and rounded, but always with more to reveal as the dream draws them on. I read this book some months ago, but it haunts me still.

A powerful mystery, very evocative of India
The story of Bhalu blends remembering an idyllic youth in India some forty years ago while coming to terms with re-encountering his first love whose story is intertwined with his own. They must try to find out the real reason their families had to flee post-independence India.

The unravelling mystery spans Bhalu’s dissatisfied middle age in present day England and both the India he remembers and the changed land he returns to in order to confront what remains of the malignant past.

The author seamlessly blends fact and fiction in a powerful novel that explores the impact of crime on whole families, the innocent and the deceivers alike. Reading Bhalu’s memories of Indian country life and his adventures in Bombay the descriptions were so strong I felt I could taste and smell the places he visits.

All this plus good characters and an intriguing plot combine to make an excellent book, which I strongly recommend.