Mostly Murders

A True Crime Podcast-style Book Review

Radhi Zaveri takes a deep breath, trying to steel herself. Temple Hill demands perfection, polish and poise, and Radhi is not about to give anyone the satisfaction of her appearing as if she doesn’t belong here anymore. After a decade abroad in the US, Radhi has returned to Mumbai, and to Temple Hill in all its glory, richness and make-believe happiness.

Welcome to Mostlymurders, the bookstagram account where we look at fictional murders and ask ourselves a very important question: is this worth reading? I am your host, Mostly, and I am joined here by my good friend Book. Today we are looking at A Mumbai Murder Mystery by Meeti Shroff-Shah.

Mostly: A murder mystery set among the Mumbai elite, featuring an amateur sleuth who is an award-winning writer and determined to make her own way in life no matter what other people say. Honestly, this one was bound to be a hit with me!

Book: Makes sense. You love historical mysteries with upper-class characters and servants murdering each other and gossiping about scandals and family secrets. This one is almost like that, except of course for the fact that it is set in modern-day Mumbai instead of some quaint little village in the 1920s.

Mostly: True, we have a rich, dysfunctional family with a temperamental patriarch, a long-suffering second wife, sons and daughters-in-law and live-in servants who all have their own grievances and secrets. And we have a main character who is both familiar and estranged from the glamorous upper-crust life described, offering witty and sharp observations on the pretence and practices of the highs and lows of Temple Hill.

Book: I like that it was totally different from a British or American murder mystery. We’ve read lots of books set in quaint villages in England and the US. It was really cool to read about a completely different culture with different languages, religious beliefs and traditions.

Mostly: I agree. Meeti Shroff-Shah paints a both beautiful and harrowing picture of Mumbai, and for someone like me who doesn’t know that much about Mumbai or India, it is exotic and exciting and a breath of fresh air from the many Western mysteries I’ve read. And the food. The descriptions of foods in this one are so mouthwatering! I don’t know half of the dishes presented in this book, but I still want to devour them all, they just sound so delicious!

Book: I just knew you would say that. I’m so jealous of Radhi, if I was surrounded by foods like that, I would gain so much weight you would have to cart me around in a wheelbarrow!

Mostly: Me too! I’m supposed to be on a diet, but listen to this: “fried puris, a spicy yellow lentil daal doused in ghee, paneer cubes simmered in a spinach gravy and basundi, a creamy, saffron-flavoured, sweet dish made of reduced milk and topped with a generous sprinkle of cashews and almonds.” How can I possibly have a mixed salad with no dressing and poached turkey breast after reading something like that? Cancel swimsuit season this year please!

Book: Just go with me to the gym, Mostly, my trainer can make you a program that will burn all that food right off you body!

Mostly: Ugh, that sounds even worse than mixed salad! Let’s just return to the book. When Radhi returns to Mumbai, she is looking forward to reconnecting with her best friend Sanjana who is heavily pregnant. But when Radhi goes to visit her friend, she is shocked to find that her father has just died. The police think it’s a suicide, but Sanjana is convinced her father would never take her own life and asks Radhi to help her find out what really happened.

Book: I like a good best-friend-sleuths mystery!

Mostly: Me too! Two heads are better than one, afterall, and it also makes good sense to have Sanjana, a character who knows all the ins and outs of both Temple Hill and her own family, and Radhi, a character who has an impartial, inquisitive mind. Put together, the two of them have what it takes to solve the mystery. I also liked the location. The fact that people live in apartments is perfect, as it gives not only the family of the deceased, but also people in the neighbouring apartments an opportunity to commit murder or a chance to have seen or overheard something important, and the number of visiting tradesmen, hawkers and merchants who form a steady stream of people coming and going to Temple Hill see to the needs of the rich and prosperous, makes for excellent added potential witnesses and/or suspects.

Book: True. This isn’t one of those locked-room, small-number-of-suspects-in-a-remote-countryside-estate kind of stories. This is a potential murder in the middle of a big city, in a big apartment complex that is constantly full of people.

Mostly: Yes, and I think it’s an excellent setting. Any number of people could have done it, leaving Radhi with lots of suspects, but also a lot of work to do, and I for one really enjoyed reading about her attempts to discover the truth about her friend’s father’s death.

Book: Me too, great first book in a series and I would be happy to read more of the same.

Mostly: Then you’ll be pleased to hear that there are two more books in the series, A Matrimonial Murder and The Mumbai School for Murder. And that concludes our talk for today. It’s time for lunch now, what do you say, Book, takeaway from that Indian place down the street?

Book: Definitely! Last one there gets the bill!

Mostly: Hey, wait! Book! Hey!

Murder mystery – Cozy mystery